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FACSIMILE OF THE SHERD OFAMENARTAS.

ONE '/z SIZE.

GreaJtesL lenqth,of the..origuuiL fO'h inches.
Grcaiesb breadth 7 inches

We.igH ^!*3fi ox.

FACSIMILE OF THE REVERSE OF THE SHERO 0FAMENARTA5

ONE ;/z SIZE

SHE

A HISTORY OF ADVENTURE

BY

H. RIDEE HAGGAED

AUTHOn Off

KIKCf SOLOMON'S MINES' 'DAWN' "J'EE WITCH'S HEAD' ETC.

Doggerel couplet from the Slierd of Amenartas

LONDON
LONGMANS, GEEEN,, AND CO.

1887

All rights reserved

o

U; '■•■

PItlKTED BT

SPOTnSWOODE ASB CO., SBW-STEEKT SQUAEB

LOK'SON

^'b(xc "2 ^'>"tf.i'

SHE

BY THE SAME AVTIIOB

CETYWAYO AND HIS WHITE NEIGHBOURS

DAWN

THE WITCH'S HEAD

KING SOLOMON'S MINES

I INSCBIBE THIS HISTOEY

TO

ANDEEW LANG

IN TOKEN OF PERSONAL EBGtAED
■ AND OF
JUY SINCBEE ADMIEATION FOB HIS LEAEJIING AND HIS WOEKS

PLATES.
(To precede Title-page.)

Fac-simile of the Sheed of Amenaktas, one-half size.
Pac-simile of the BavEESE of the Sheed of Amenaktas,

ONE-HALF SIZE.

CONTENTS.

INTRODUCTION
I. MY VISITOB ...

II. THE TEARS ROLL BY

III. THE SHERD OF AMENAETAS .

IV. THE SQUAII, ....
V. THE HEAD OF THE ETHIOPIAN

VI. AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CEREMONY
VII. USTANE SINGS
Vin. THE FEAST, AND AFTER 1 .
IX. A LITTLE FOOT .
X. SPECULATIONS . . , ,

XI. THE PLAIN OF KOR
XII. ' SHE '..,,.
XIII. AYESHA UNVEILS .
XrV. A SOUL IN HELL
XV. AYESHA GIVES JUDGMENT .
XVI. THE TOMBS OF k6e.
XVII. THE BALANCE TURNS ,

xviiL GO, woman! ....

XIX. ' GIVE MB A BLACK GOAT ! ' .

XX. TRIUMPH

XXI. THE DEAD AND LIVING MEET
XXn. JOB HAS A PRESENTIMENT
XXIII. THE TEMPLE OF TRUTH
XXrV. WALKING THE PLANK
XXV. THE SPIRIT OF LIFE .
XXVI. WHAT WE SAW
XXVII. WE LEAP . .

XXVni. OVER THE MOUNTAIN

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310

ALLAN QUATBEMAIN:

BEINO AN AOOOUNI OF HIS

FUETHEE ADVENTUEES AND . DISCOVEEIES

IN COMPANY WITH

Sir HENEY CUETIS, Bart., Commander JOHN GOOD, E.N.
and one UMSLOPOGAAS.

By H. RIDER HAGGARD,

Av'lior of 'King Solomon's Mines,' 'Saan,' 'The Wllch's Bead,' itc.

Is commenced in the January Number of
Longman's Magazine.

S H E .

INTEODUOTION.

In giving to the world the record of what, looked at aa
an adventure only, is I suppose one of the most wonderful
and mysterious experiences ever undergone by mortal men,
I feel it incumbent on me to explain what my exact con-
' nection with it is. And so I may as weU say at once that
1 am not the narrator but only the editor of this extra-
ordinary history, and then go on to tell how it found its
way into my hands.

Some years ago I, the editor, was stopping with a
friend, 'vir docUssimus et amicus meus,' at a certain Uni-
versity, which for the purposes of this history we will call
Cambridge, and was one day much struck with the appear-
ance of two people whom I saw going arm-in-arm down
the street. One of these gentlemen was I think, without
exception, the handsomest young fellow I have ever seen.
He was very tall, very broad, and had a look of power and
a grace of bearing that seemed as native to him as it is to
a wild stag. In addition his face was almost without flaw
— a good face as well as a beautiful one, and when he
lifted his hat, which he did just then to a passing lady,
I saw that his head was covered with little golden curls
growing close to the scalp.

' Good gracious ! ' I said to my friend, with whom I
was walking, ' why, that fellow looks like a statue of Apollo
come to life. What a splendid man he is 1'

2 SHE I

I

' Yes,' lie answered, ' he is the hanasomest man in thri
University, and one of the nicest too. They call hini
" the Greek god " ; but look at the other one, he's Vineey'ii
(that's the god's name) guardian, and supposed to he full
of every land of information. They call him " Charon."
I looked, and found the older man quite as interesting in
his way as the glorified specimen of humanity at his side,
lie appeared to be about forty years of age, and waa
I think as ugly as his companion was handsome. To
begin with, he was shortish, rather bow-legged, very deep
chested, and with unusually long arms. He had dark hair
and small eyes, and the hair grew right down on his fore-
head, and his whiskers grew right up to his hair, so that
there was uncommonly little of his countenance to be seen.
Altogether he reminded me forcibly of a goriUa, and yet there
was something very pleasing and genial about the man's
eye. I remember saying that I should like to know him.

'All right,' answered my friend, 'nothing easier. I
know Vincey ; I'll introduce you,' and he did, and for
some minutes we stood chatting — about the Zulu people, I
think, for I had just returned from the Cape at the time.
Presently, however, a stoutish lady, whose name I do not
remember, came along the pavement, accompanied by a
pretty fair-haired girl, and these two Mr. Vincey, who
clearly knew them well, at once joined, walking off m their
company. I remember being rather amused because of the
change in the expression of the elder man, whose name I
discovered was Holly, when he saw the ladies advanomg.
He suddenly stopped short in his talk, cast a reproachful
look at his companion, and, with an abrupt nod to myself,
turned and marched ofE alo]:i6 across the street. I heard
afterwards that he was popularly supposed to be as much
afraid of a woman as most people are of a mad dog, which
accounted for his precipitate retreat. I cannot say, how-
ever, that young Vincey showed much aversion to feminine
society on this occasion. Indeed I remember laughing,
and remarking to my friend at the time that he was not the
sort of man whom it would be desirable to introduce to the

I INTf4 }.. 'TION 3

k
(lady one -vvas going to marry, since it is e^c^dingly prob-
able that the acquaiatance would end iai a'frat8S(|gr of her
affections. He was altogether too good'^lcrldaSgiiaflij-what
is more, he had none of that consciousftess' aiid .ooftijejt
about him which usually afiliets handsome men, aia^" ;?
makes them deservedly disliked by their fellows. ■ >-.. "^ *
That same evening my visit came to an end, and '^^^'^
was the last I saw or heard of ' Charon ' and ' the Greek gorl'* ♦
for many a long day. Indeed, I have never seen either of
them from that hour to this, and do not think it probable
that I shall. But a month ago I received a letter and two !
packets, one of manuscript, and on ojouang the first found "
that it was signed by ' Horace HoUy,' a name that at the
moment was not familiar to me. It ran as follows ; —

' College, Cambridge, May 1, 18 —

'My deab Sir, — You wiU be surprised, considering
the very slight nature of our acquaintance, to get a letter
from me. Indeed, I think I had better begin by remind-
ing you that we once met, now ^ome five years ago^when
I and my ward Leo Vincey were introduced to you in
the street at Cambridge. To be brief and come to my
business. I have recently read with much interest a book
of yours describing a Central African adventure. I take
it that this book is partly true, and partly an eifort of the
imagination. However this is, it has given me an idea.
It happens, how you will see in the accompanying manu-
script (which together with the Scarab, the J^Bgyjl._S-pil
of the Sun," and the_original shef3^_am sending to you
l)y EaS3), that my ward, or rather my adopted son Leo
Vincey and myself have recently passed thr-augh a real
African adventure, of a nature so much more marvellous
than the one which you describe, that to teU. you the truth
I am almost ashamed to submit it to you for fear - lest you
should disbelieve my tale. You will see it stated in this
manuscript that I, or rather we, had made up our minds not
to make this history public during our joint lives. Nor
should we alter our determination were it not for a cir-

b2

4 SHE

cumstance which has recently arisen. We are for reasons
that, after perusing this manuscript, you may be able toi
guess, going away again, this time to Central Asia where,
.;%,if anywhere upon this earth, wisdom is to be found, and we
■' *Miicipate that our sojourn there wiU be a long one. Pos-
;:-^ sij^we shall not return. Under these altered conditions
,-<_^^ has become a question whether we are justified in
witihplding from the world an account of a phenomenon
which we beheve to be of unparalleled interest, merely
because ouf^ private hfe is involved, or because we are
afraid of ridicule aild<>doubt being oast upon our statements.
I hold one view about this matter, and Leo holds another,
and finally, after much discussion, we have come to a com-
promise, namely, to send the history to you, giving you
full leave to pubUsh it if you think fit, the only stipulation
being that you shall disguise our real names, and as much
concerning our personal identity as is consistent with the
maintenance of the hona fides of the narrative.

'And now what am I to say further? I reaUy do
not know beyond once more repeating that everything is
described in the accompanying manuscript exactly as it
happened. As regards She herself I have nothing to add.
Day by day we have greater occasion to regret that we did not
better avail ourselves of our opportunities to obtain more
information from that marvellous woman. Who was she ?
How did she first come to the Caves of K6r, and what was
her real religion ? We never ascertained, and now, alas 1
we never shall, at least not yet. These and many other
questions arise in my mind, but what is the good of asking
themi now ? ,

' WiU you undertake the task ? We give you complete
freedom, and as a reward you will, we beheve, have the
credit of presenting to the world the most wonderful
history, as distinguished from romance, that its records
can show. Bead the manuscript (which I have copied out
fairly for your benefit), and let me know.
' Believe me, very truly yours,

' L. HoEACE Holly.

INTRODUCTION 5

' P.S. — Of course, if any profit results from the sale of
the writing should you care to undertake its publication,
you can do what you like with it, but if there is a loss I
will leave instructions with my lawyers, Messrs. Geoffrey
and Jordan, to meet it. We entrust the sherd, the scarab,
and the parchments to your keeping tUl such time as we
demand them back again. — L. H. H.'

This letter, as may be imagined, astonished me consid-.^
erably, but when I came to look at the MS., which the""
pressure of other work prevented me from doing for a fort-
night, I was still more astonished, as I think the reader
will be also, and at once made up my mind to press on
with the matter. I wrote to this effect to Mr. Holly, but a
week afterwards received a letter from that gentleman's
lawyers, returning my own, with the information that their
client and Mr. Leo Vinoey had already left this coimtry
for Thibet, and they did not at present know their
address.

Well, that is all I have to say. Of the history itself
the reader must judge. I give it him, with the exception
of a very few alterations, made with the object of conceal-
ing the identity of the actors from the general pubhc,
exactly as it has come to me. Personally I have made up
my mind to refrain from comments. At first I was inclined
to believe that this history of a woman on whom, clothed
in the majesty of her almost endless years, the shadow of
Eternity itself lay like the dark wing of Night, was some
gigantic allegory of which I could not catch the meaning.
Then I thought that it might be a bold attempt to portray
the possible results of practical immortahty, informing the
substance of a mortal who yet drew her strength from
-Earth, and in whose human bosom passions yet rose and fell
and beat as in the undying world around her the winds and
the tides rise and fall and beat unceasingly. But as I wont
on I abandoned that idea also. To me the story seems to
bear the stamp of truth upon its face. Its explanation I
must leave to others, and with this slight preface, which

6 SHE \

circumstances make necessary, I introduce the world to
Ayesha and the Caves of K6r. — The Editob.

P.S. — There is on consideration one circumstance thati
after a reperusal of this history, struck me with so much
force that I cannot resist calling the attention of the reader
to it. He will observe that so far as we are made acquainted
with him there appears to be nothing in the character of
Leo Vmoey which in the opuiion of most people would have
been likely to attract an intellect so powerful as that of
Ayesha. He is not even, at any rate to my view, particu-
larly interesting. Indeed, one might imagine that Mr.
Holly would under ordinary circumstances have easily out-
stripped him in the favour of She. Can it be that ex-
tremes meet, and that the very excess and splendour of her
mind led her by means of some strange physical reaction
to worship at the shrine of matter? Was that ancient
Kalhkrates nothing but a splendid animal beloved for his
hereditary Greek beauty ? Or is the true explanation what
I believe it to be — namely, that Ayesha, seeing further than
we can see, perceived the germ and smouldering spark cf
greatness which lay hid within her lover's soul, and well
knew that under the influence of her gift of Ufe, watered
by her wisdom, and shone upon with the sunshme of her
presence, it would bloom like a flower and flash out like a
star, filling the world with light and fragrance ?

Here also I am not able to answer, but must leave the
reader to form his own judgment on the facts before him,
as detailed by Mr. Holly in the following pages.

I.

MY VISITOB.

'■: Thebb are some events of which each circumstance and
surrounding detail seems to be graven on the memory
in such fashion that we cannot forget it, and so it is with
the scene that I am about to describe. It rises as clearly
before my mind at this moment as though it had happened
yesterday.

It was in this very month something over twenty years
ago that I, Ludwig Horace Holly, was sitting one night in
my rooms at Cambridge, grinding away at some mathe-
matical work, I forget what, I was to go up for my fellow^
ship within a week, and was expected by my tutor and my
college generally to distinguish myself. At last, wearied
out, I flung my book down, and, going to the mantelpiece,
took down a pipe and filled it. There was a candle burn-
ing on the mantelpiece, and a long, narrow glass at the
back of it ; and as I was in the act of lighting the pipe I
caught sight of my own countenance in the glass, and
paused to reflect. The lighted match burnt away till it
scorched my fingers, forcing me to drop it ; but stiU I stood
and stared at myself in the glass, and reflected.

' Well,' I said aloud, at last, 'it is to be hoped that I
shall be able to do something with the inside of my head,
for I shall certainly never do anything by the help of the
outside.'

This remark will doubtless strike anybody who reads it
as being slightly obscure, but I was in reaUty alluding to
.my physical deficiencies. Most men of twenty-two are
endowed at any rate with some share of the comeliness of
youth, but to me even this was denied. Short, thick-set.

8 SHE

and deep-chested almost to deformity, with long sineww
arms, heavy features, deep-set grey eyes, a low brow half
overgrown with a mop of thick black hair, Hke a deserte d
clearing on which the forest had once more begun to ert-
croach; such was my appearance nearly a quarter of ii.
century ago, and such, with some modification, is it to thii i
day. Like Cain, I was branded — ^branded by Nature with
the stamp of abnormal ugliness, as I was gifted by Natura
with iron and abnormal strength and considerable inteUec4
tual powers. So ugly was I that the spruce young men oil
my College, though they were proud enough of my feats oi?
endurance and physical prowess, did not even care to be
seen walking with me. Was it wonderful that I was mis-
anthropic and sullen? Was it wonderful that I brooded
and worked alone, and had no friends — at least, only one ?
I was set apart by Nature to Uve alone, and draw comforc
from her breast, and hers only. Women hated the sight
of me. Only a week before I had heard one call me b,
' monster ' when she thought I was out of hearing, and say
that I had converted her to the monkey theory. Once,
indeed, a woman pretended to care for me, and I lavished
all the pent-up affection of my nature upon her. Then
money that was to have come to me went elsewhere, and
she discarded me. I pleaded with her as I have never
pleaded with any Mving creature before or since, for I was
caught by her sweet face, and loved her ; and in the end
by way of answer she took me to the glass, and stood side
by side with me, and looked into it.

' Now,' she said, ' if I am Beauty, who are you ? '
That was when I was only twenty.

And so I stood and stared, and felt a sort of grim satis-
faction in the sense of my own loneliness ; for I had neither
father, nor mother, nor brother ; and as I did so there
came a knock at my door,

I listened before I went to open it, for it was nearly
twelve o'clock at night, and I was in no mood to admit any
stranger, I had but one friend in the College, or, indeed,
in the world — perhaps it was he,

MY VISITOR 9

i

Just then the person outside the door coughed, and I
hastened to open it, for I knew the cough.

A tall man of about thirty, with the remains of great
iiersonal beauty, came hurrying in7 staggering beneath the
weight of a massive iron box which he carried by a handle
with his right hand. He placed the box upon the table, and
then fell into an awful fit of coughing. He coughed and
coughed tni his face became quite purple, and at last he
sank into a chair and began to spit up blood. I poured
out some whisky into a tumbler, and gave it to him. He
drank it, and seemed better ; though his better was very
bad indeed.

' Why did you keep me standing there in the cold ? ' he
asked pettishly. ' You know the draughts are death to me.'

' I did not know who it was,' I answered. ' You are a
late visitor.'

' Yes ; and I verily believe it is my last visit,' he an-
swered, with a ghastly attempt at a smile. ' I am done
for, Holly. I am done for. I do not beheve that I shall
see to-morrow ! '

' Nonsense 1 ' I said. ' Let me go for a doctor.'

He waved me back imperiously with his hand. ' It is
sober sense ; but I want no doctors. I have studied medi-
cine, and I know all about it. No doctors can help me.
My last hour has come ! For a year past I have only lived
by a miracle. Now hsten to me as you never listened to
anybody before ; for you will not have the opportunity
of getting me to repeat my words. We have been friends
for two years ; now tell me how much do you know about
me?'

' I know that you are rich, end have had a fancy to
come to College long after the age that most men leave it.
I know that you have been married, and that your wife
died ; and that you have been the best, indeed almost the
only friend I ever had.'

' Did you know that I have a son ?

'No.''

' I have, He is five years old. He post mp his mother's

10 SHE ',

life, and I have never been able to bear to look upon lii^
face in consequence. Holly, if you ■will accept the trust, I
am going to leave you that boy's sole guardian.' i

I sprang almost out of my chair. ' Me 1 ' I said.

' Yes, you. I have not studied you for two years for
nothing. I have known for some time that I could noi
last, and since I realised the fact I have been searching
for some one to whom I could confide the boy and this,'
and he tapped the iron box. ' You are the man, HoUy ;.
for, Uke a rugged tree, you are hard and sound at core/.
Listen ; the boy wiU be the only representative of one of the
most ancient families in the world, that is, so far as families
can be traced. You will laugh at me when I say it, but
one day it will be proved to you beyond a doubt, that my
sixty-fifth or sixty- sixth Uneal ancestor was an Egyptian
priest of Isis, though he was himself of Grecian extraction,
and was called KaUikrates.^ His father was one of the
Greek mercenaries raised by Hak-Hor, a Mendesian Pharaoh
of the twenty-ninth dynasty, and his grandfather, I be-
Heve, was that very Kallikrates mentioned by Herodotus.^
In or about the year 339 before Christ, just at the time
of the final fall of the Pharaohs, this KaUikrates (the
priest) broke his vows of celibacy and fled from Egypt
with a Princess of Eoyal blood who had fallen in love

' The Strong and Beautiful, or, more accurately, the Beautiful in
strength.

" The Kallikrates here referred to by my friend ■was a Spartan,
spoken of by Herodotus (Herod, ix. 72) as being remarkable for his
beauty. He fell at the glorious battle of Platsa (September 22,
B.C. 479), ■when the Laced£Emonians and Athenians under Pausanias
routed the Persians, putting nearly 300,000 of them to the sword.
The following is a translation of the passage, ' For Kallikrates died
out of the battle, he came to the army the most beautiful man ot
the Greeks of that day — not only of the LaoedsBmonians themselves,
but of the other Greeks also. He when Pausanias was sacrificing was
wounded in the side by an arrow ; and then they fought, but on
being carried off he regretted his death, and said to Arimnestus, a
Platffian, that he did not grieve at dying for Greece, but at not having
struck a blow, or, although he desired so to do, performed any deed
worthy of himself.' This Kallikrates, who appears to have been as
brave as he was beautiful, is subsequently mentioned by Herodotus
as having been buried among the Ipiv^s (young commanders), apart
from the other Spartans and the Helots.— L. H. H.

I MV VISITOR II

with liim, and was finally wrecked upon the coast of
Africa, somewhere, as I believe, in the neighbourhood
(jf where Delagoa Bay now is, or rather to the north of
it, he and his wife being saved, and all the remainder
of their company destroyed in one way or another. Here
they endured great hardships, but were at last entertained
by the mighty Queen of a savage people, a white woman
of peciiliar loveliness, who, under circumstances which I
cannot enter into, but which you will one day learn, if you
live, from the contents of the box, finally murdered my
ancestor, Kallikrates. His wife, however, escaped, how I
know not, to Athens, bea,ring a child with her, whom she
named Tisisthenes, or the Mighty Avenger. Five hundred
years or more afterwards the family migrated to Rome
under circumstances of which no trace remains, and here,
probably with the idea of preserving the idea of vengeance
which we find set out in the name of Tisisthenes, they appear
to have pretty regularly assumed the cognomen of Vindex,
or Avenger. Here, too, they remained for another five cen-
turies or more, till about 770 a.d., when Charlemagne m-
vaded Lombardy, where they were then settled, whereon
the head of the family seems to have attached himself to
the great Emperor, and to have returned with him across
the Alps, and finally to have settled in Brittany. Eight
generations later his lineal representative crossed to Eng-
land in the reign of Edward the Confessor, and in the time
of William the Conqueror was advanced to great honour
and power. Prom that time tiU. the present day I can trace
my descent without a break. Not that the Vinceys — ^for
that was the final corruption of the name after its bearers
took root in English soil — have been particularly distin-
guished — they never came much to the fore. Sometimes
they were soldiers, sometimes merchants, but on the whole
they have preserved a dead level of respectability, and a
still deader level of mediocrity. From the time of Charles
II. till the beginning of the present century they were
merchants. About 1790 my grandfather made a consider-
able fortune out of brewing, and retired. In 1821 he died.

12 SHE \

\
and my father succeeded him, and dissipated most of th(

money. Ten years ago he died also, leaving me a nej
j income of about two thousand a year. Then it was that \
undertook an expedition in connection with that,' and hi?
pointed to the iron chest, ' which ended disastrously enough'.
On my way back I travelled in the South of Europe, anc .
finally reached Athens. There I met my beloved wife, whc
might weU also have been called the " Beautiful," Hke mj,
old Greek ancestor. There I married her, and there, a
year afterwards, when my boy was bom, she died.'

He paused a while, his head sunk upon his hand, and
then continued —

' My marriage had diverted me from a project which I
cannot enter into now. I have no time. Holly — I have no
time ! One day, if you accept my trust, you wUl learn all
about it. After my wife's death I turned my mind to it
again. But first it was necessary, or, at least, I conceived
that it was necessary, that I should attain to a perfect
knowledge of Eastern dialects, especially Arabic. It was
to facilitate my studies that I came here. Very soon, how-
ever, my disease developed itself, and now there is an end
of me.' And as though to emphasise his words he burst
intO' another terrible fit of coughing.

I gave him some more whisky, and after resting he
went on —

' I have never seen my boy, Leo, since he was a tiny
baby. I never could bear to see him, but they tell me that
he is a quick and handsome child. In this envelope,' and
he produced a letter from his pocket addressed to myself,
' I have jotted down the course I wish followed in the
boy's education. It is a somewhat pecuHar one. At any
rate, I could not entrust it to a stranger. Once more,
wiU you undertake it ? '

' I must first know what I am to undertake,' I answered.

' You are to undertake to have the boy, Leo, to live
with you till lie is twenty-five years of age — not to send
him to school, remember. On his twenty-fifth birthday
your guardianship will end, and you will then, with the

I MY VISITOR 13

keys tliat I give you now ' (and he placed them on the
table), ' open the iron box, and let him see and read the
cbntents, and say whether or no he is willing to undertake
the quest. There is no obHgation on him to do so. Now,
as regards terms. My present income is two thousand
two hundred a year. Half of that income I have secured
to you by will for life contingently on your imdertaking the
guardianship — that is, one thousand a year remuneration
to yourself, for you wiU have to give up your life to it, and
one hundred a year to pay for the board of the boy. The
rest is to accumulate till Leo is twenty-five, so that there
may be a sum in hand should he wish to undertake the
quest of which I spoke.'

' And suppose I were to die ? ' I asked.

' Then the boy must become a ward of Chancery and
take his chance. Only be careful that the iron chest is
passed on to him by your will. Listen, Holly, don't re-
fuse me. Believe me, this is to your advantage. You are
not fit to mix with the world — it would only embitter you.
In a few weeks you wiU become a Fellow of your College,
and the income that you will derive from that combined
with what I have left you will enable you to live a life of
learned leisure, alternated with the sport of which you are
so fond, such as will exactly suit you.'

He paused and looked at me anxiously, but I still
hesitated. The charge seemed so very strange. .

' For my sake, Holly. We have been good friends,
and I have no time to make other arrangements.'

' Very well,' I said, ' I will do it, provided there is
nothing in this paper to make me change my mind,' and I
touched the envelope he had put upon the table by the
keys.

' Thank you. Holly, thank you. There is nothing at
all. Swear to me by God that you will be a father to the
boy, and follow my directions to the letter.'

' I swear it,' I answered solemnly.

' Very well, remember that perhaps one day I shall ask
for the account of your oath, for though I am dead and

14 SHE !

forgotten, yet shall I live. There is no such thing as death, 1
Holly, only a change, and, as you may perhaps learn inj
time to come, I beUeve that even here that change couldl
under certain circumstances be indefinitely postponed,' and,
again he broke into one of his dreadful fits of coughing. !

' There,' he said, ' I must go, you have the chest, anc^
my -will will be found among my papers, under the authority
of which the child will be handed over to you. You will
be well paid, Holly, and I know that you are honest, but
if you betray my trust, by Heaven I will haunt you.'

I said nothing, being, indeed, too bewildered to speak.

He held up the candle, and looked at his own face in
the glass. It had been a beautiful face, but disease had
wrecked it. ' Pood for the worms,' he said. ' Curious to
think that in a few hours I shall be stiff and cold — the
journey done, the little game played out. Ah me, Holly !
life is not worth the trouble of life, except when one is in
love — at least, mine has not been ; but the boy Leo's may
be if he has the courage and the faith. Good-bye, my
friend ! ' and with a sudden access of tenderness he flung
his arm about me and kissed me on the forehead, and then
turned to go.

' Look here, Vinoey,' I said, ' if you are as ill as you
think, you had better let me fetch a doctor.'

' No, no,' he said earnestly. ' Promise me that you
won't. I am going to die, and, like a poisoned rat, I wish
to die alone.'

' I don't believe that you are going to do anything
of the sort,' I answered. He smiled, and, with the word
' Eemember ' on his lips, was gone. As for myself, I sat
down and rubbed my eyes, wondering if I had been asleep.
As this supposition would not bear investigation I gave it
up, and began to think that Vincey must have been drmk-
ing. I knew that he was, and had been, very ill, but still
it seemed impossible that he could be in such a condition
as to be able to know for certain that he would not outlive
the night. Had he been so near dissolution surely he
would scarcely have been able to walk, and carry a heavy

MY VISITOR IS

iron box with him. The whole story, on reflection, seemed
me utterly incredible, for I was not then old enough to
le aware how many things happen in this world that the
common sense of the average man would set down as so
improbable as to be absolutely impossible. This is a fact
that I have only recently mastered. Was it likely that a
man would have a son five years of age whom he had
never seen since he was a tiny infant ? No. Was it likely
that he could foretell his own death so accurately ? No.
Was it likely that he could trace his pedigree for more than
three centuries before Christ, or that he would suddenly
confide the absolute guardianship of his child, and leave
half his fortune, to a college friend ? Most certainly not.
Clearly Vincey was either drunk or mad. That being so,
what did it mean ? and what was in the sealed iron
chest ?

The whole thing baffled and puzzled me to such an
extent that at last I could stand it no longer, and deter-
mined to sleep over it. So I jumped up, and having put
the keys and the letter that Vincey had left away into my
despatch-box, and stowed the iron chest in a large port-
manteau, I turned in, and was soon fast asleep.

As it seemed to me, I had only been asleep for a few
minutes when I was awakened by somebody emailing me. I
sat up and rubbed my eyes ; it was broad daylight — eight
o'clock, in fact.

' Why, what is the matter with you, John ? ' I asked of
the gyp who waited on Vincey and myself. ' You look as
though you had seen a ghost ! '

' Yes, sir, and so I have,' he answered, ' leastways I've
seen a corpse, which is worse. I've been in to call Mr.
Vincey, as usual, and there he lies stark and dead 1 '

i6 SHE

IL

THE TEAES EOLL BY.

Of course, poor Vincey's sudden death created a great
stir in tlie College ; but, as he was known to be very ill,
and a satisfactory doctor's certificate was forthcoming,
there was no inquest. They were not bo particular about
inquests in those days as they are now ; indeed, they were
generally disliked, as causing a scandal. Under all these
circumstances, as I was asked no questions, I did not feel
called upon to volunteer any information about our inter-
view of the night of Vincey's decease, beyond saying that
he had come into my rooms to see me, as he often did.
On the day of the funeral a lawyer came down from London
and followed my poor friend's remains to the grave, and
then went back with his papers and effects, except, of
course, the iron chest which had been left in my keeping.
For a week after this I heard no more of the matter, and,
indeed, my attention was amply occupied in other ways, for
I was up for my Fellowship, a fact that had prevented me
from attending the funeral or seeing the lawyer. At last,
however, the examination was over, and I came back to
my rooms and sank into an easy chair with a happy con-
sciousness that I had got through it very fairly.

Soon, however, my thoughts, relieved of the pressure
that had crushed them into a single groove during the last
few days, turned to the events of the night of poor Vincey's
death, and again I asked myself what it all meant, and
wondered if I should hear anything more of the matter, and
if I did not, what it would be my duty to do with the curioub
iron chest. I sat there and thought and thought till I began

THE YEARS ROLL BY 17

to grow quite disturbed over the whole occurrence : the
mysterious midnight visit, the prophecy of death so shortly
to be fulfilled, the solemn oath that I had taken, and which
Vincey had called on me to answer to in another world than
this. Had the man committed suicide ? It looked Kke it.
And what was the quest of which he spoke ? The circum-
stances were almost uncanny, so much so that, though I
am by no means nervous, or apt to be alarmed at anything
that may seem to cross the bounds of the natural, I grew
afraid, and began to wish I had had nothing to do with it.
How much more do I wish it now, over twenty years
afterwards !

As I sat and thought, there was a knock at the door,
and a letter, in a big blue envelope, was brought in to me.
I saw at a glance that it was a lawyer's letter, and an in-
stinct told me that it was connected with my trust. The
letter, which I still have, runs thus : —

' Sib, — Our client, the late M. L. Vincey, Esq., who

died on the 9th instant in College, Cambridge, has

left behind him a WiU, of which you will please find copy
enclosed, and of which we are the executors. By this WiU
you will perceive that you take a life-interest in about half
of the late Mr. Vincey's property, now invested in Consols,
subject to your acceptance of the guardianship of his only
son, Leo Vincey. at present an infant, aged five. Had we
not ourselves drawn up the document in question in obe-
dience to Mr. Vincey's clear and precise instructions, both
personal and written, and had he not then assured us that
he had very good reasons for what he was doing, we are
bound to tell you that its provisions seem to us of so
unusual a nature, that we should have felt bound to call
the attention of the Court of Chancery to them, in order
that such steps might be taken as seemed desirable to it,
either by contesting the capacity of the testator or other-
wise, to safeguard the interests of the infant. As it is,
knowing that the testator was a gentleman of the highest
intelligence and acumen, and that he has absolutely no

1^

i8 SHE

relations living to whom Jie could have confided the guar-
dianship of the child, we do not feel justified in taking this
course.

' Awaiting such instructions as you please to send us as^
regards the deUvery of the infant and the payment of the
proportion of the dividends due to you,

' We remain, Sir, faithfully yours,

' Geoiteb^ and Joedan.'

I put down the letter, and ran my eye through the Will,
which appeared, fi:om its utter uniftteUigibihty, to have
been drawn on the strictest legal principles. So far as I
could discover, however, it exactly bore out what my friend
had told me on the night of his death. So it was true after
all. I must take the boy. " Suddenly I remembered the letter
which he had left with the chest. I fetched it and opened
it. It only contained such directions as he had already
given to me as to opening the chest on Leo's twenty-fifth
birthday, and laid down the outHnes of the boy's educatifin,
which was to include Greek, the higher Mathematics, and
Arabic. At the bottom there was a postscript to the effect
that if the boy died under the age of twenty-five, which,
however, he did not believe would be the case, I was to
open the chest, and act on the information I obtained
if I saw fit. If I did not see fit, I was to destroy all
the contents. On no account was I to pass them on to a
stranger.

As this letter added nothing material to my knowledge,
and certainly raised no further objection in my mmd to un-
dertaking the task I had promised my dead friend to under-
take, there was only one course open to me — namely, to
write to Messrs. Geoffrey and Jordan, and express my readi-
ness to enter on the trust, stating that I should be ■wiUing
to commence my guardianship of Leo in ten days' time.
This done I proceeded to the authorities of my college, and, .
having told them as much of the story as I considered
desirable, which was not very much, after considerable
difficulty succeeded in persuading them to stretch a point.

THE YEARS ROLL BY 19

and, in the event of my having obtained a fellowsliip,
which I was pretty certain I had done, allow me to have the
child to live with me. Their consent, however, was only
granted on the condition that I vacated my rooms in college
and took lodgings. This I did, and with some difficulty
succeeded in obtaining very good apartments quite close to
the college gates. The next thing was to find a nurse.
And on this point I came to a determination. I would
have no woman to lord it over me about the child, and
steal his affections from me. The boy was old enough to
do without female assistance, so I set to work to hunt up a
suitable male attendant. With some difficulty I succeeded
in hiring a most respectable round-faced young man, who
had been a helper in a huntmg-stable, but who said that
he was one of a family of seventeen and weU-accustomed
to the ways of children, and professed himself quite willing
to undertake the charge of Master Leo when he arrived.
Then, having taken the iron box to town, and with my own
hands deposited it at my banker's, I bought some books
upon the health and management of children, and read
them, first to myself, and then aloud to Job — that was the
young man's name — and waited.

At length the child arrived in the charge of an elderly
person, who wept bitterly at parting with him, and a
beautiful boy he was. Indeed, I do not think that I ever
saw such a perfect ehUd before or since. His eyes were
grey, his forehead broad, and his face, even at that early
age, clean cut as a cameo, without being pinched or thin.
But perhaps his most attractive point was his hair, which
was pure gold in colour and tightly curled over his shapely
head. He cried a little when his nurse finally tore herself
away and left him with us. Never shall I forget the scene.
There he stood, with the sunlight from the window playing
upon his golden curls, his fist screwed in one eye, whilst
he took us in with the other. I was seated in a chair, and
stretched out my hand to him to induce him to come to
me, while Job, in the comer, was making a sort of clucking
noise, which, arguing from his previous experience, or from

c2

20 SHE

the analogy of the hen, he judged would have a soothing
effect, and inspire confidence in the youthful mind, and
running a wooden horse of peculiar hideousness backwards
and forwards in a way that was little short of inane. This
went on for some minutes, and then all of a sudden the lad
stretched out hoth his little arms and ran to me.

' I Hke you,' he said : ' you is ugly, but you is good.'

Ten minutes afterwards he was eating large shoes of
bread and butter, with every sign of satisfaction; Job
wanted to put jam on to them, but I sternly reminded him
of the excellent works we had read, and forbade it.

In a very little while (for, as I expected, I got my fellow-
ship) the boy became the favourite of the whole College —
where, aU orders and regulations to the contrary notwith-
standing, he was continually in and out — a sort of chartered
libertine, in whose favour all rules were relaxed. The offer-
ings made at his shrine were simply without number, and
I had a serious difference of opinion with one old resident
Fellow, now long dead, who was usually supposed to be the
crustiest man in the University, and to abhor the sight of
a child. And yet I discovered, when a frequently recurring
fit sickness had forced Job to keep a strict look-out, that
this unprincipled old man was in the habit of enticing the
boy to his rooms and there feeding him upon unUmited
quantities of brandy-balls, and making him promise to say
nothing about it. Job told him that he ought to be
ashamed of himself, ' at his age, too, when he might have
been a grandfather if he had done what was right,' by
which Job understood had got married, and thence arose
the row.

But I have no space to dwell upon those dehghtful years,
around which memory stiU fondly hovers. One by one they
went by, and as they passed we two grew dearer and j-et
more dear to each other. Few sons have been loved as I
love Leo, and few fathers know the deep and continuous
affection that Leo bears to me.

The child grew into the boy, and the boy into the young
man, as one by one the remorseless years flew by, and as the

THE YEARS ROLL BY 21

grew and. increased so did his beauty and the beauty of his
mind grow with him. When he was about fifteen they
used to call him Beauty about the College, and me they
nicknamed the Beast. Beauty and the Beast was what they
called us when we went out walking together, as we used to
do every day. Once Leo attacked a great strapping butcher's
man, twice his size, because he sang it out after us, and
thrashed him, too — thrashed him fairly. I walked on and
pretended not to see, till the combat got too exciting, when
I turned round and cheered him on to victory. It was the
chaff of the College at the time, but I could not help it.
Then when he was a Uttle older the undergraduates got
fresh names for us. They called me Charon and Leo the
Greek god ! I will pass over my own appellation with the
humble remark that I was never handsome, and did not grow
more so as I grew older. As for his, there was no doubt
about its fitness. Leo at twenty-one might have stood for
a statue of the youthful Apollo. I never saw anybody to
touch him iu looks, or anybody so absolutely unconscious of
them. As for his mind, he was briUiant and keen-witted,
but not a scholar. He had not the dulness necessary for
that result. We followed out his father's instructions as
regards his education strictly enough, and on the whole the
residts, especially so far as the Greek and Arabic went,
were satisfactory. I learnt the latter language in order to
help to teach it to him, but after five years of it he knew it
as well as I did — almost as well as the professor who in-
structed us both. I always was a great sportsman — it is
my one passion — and every autumn we went away some-
where shooting or fishing, sometimes to Scotland, some-
times to Norway, once even to Eussia. I am a good shot,
but even in this he learnt to excel me.

When Leo was eighteen I moved back into my rooms,
and entered him at my own College, and at twenty-one he
took his degree— a respectable degree, but not a very high
one. Then it was that I, for the first time, told him some-
thing of his own story, and of the mystery that loomed
ahead. Of course he was very curious about it, and of

22 SH£

course I explained to him that his curiosity could not be
gratified at present. After that, to pass the time away,
I suggested that he should get himself called to the Bar ;
and this he did, reading at Cambridge, and only going up
to London to eat his dinners.

I had only one trouble about him, and that was that
every young woman who came across him, or, if not every
one, nearly so, would insist on falling in love with him.
Hence arose difficulties which I need not enter into here,
though they were troublesome enough at the time. On
the whole, he behaved fairly well ; I cannot say more than
that.

And so the time went by till at last he reached his
twenty-fifth birthday, at which date this strange aad, in
some ways, awful history really begins.

23

III.

THE SHJ3ED OP AMENAETAS.

On the day preceding Leo's twenty-fiftli birthday we Isoth
proceeded to London, and extracted the mysterious chest
from the bank where I had deposited it twenty years
before. It was, I remember, brought up by the same clerk
who had taken it down. He perfectly remembered having
hidden it away. Had he not done so, he said, he should
have had difficulty in finding it, it was so covered up with
cobwebs.

In the evening we returned with our precious burden to
Cambridge, and I think, that we might both of us have
given away aU the sleep we got that night and not have
been much the poorer. At daybreak Leo arrived in my
room in a dressing-gown, and suggested that we should at
once proceed to business. I scouted the idea as showing an
unworthy curiosity. The chest had waited twenty years,
I said, so it could very well continue to wait until after
breakfast. Accordingly at nine — an unusu7,lly sharp nine
— ^we brealdasted ; and so occupied was I with my own
thoughts that I regret to state that I put a piece of bacon
into Leo's tea in mistake for a lump of sugar. Job, too, to
whom the contagion of excitement had, of course, spread,
managed to break the handle off my Sevres china tea-cup,
the identical one I believe that Marat had been drinking
from just before he was stabbed in his bath.

At last, however, breakfast was cleared away, and Job,
at my request, fetched the chest, and placed it upon the
table in a somewhat gingerly fashion, as though he mis-
trusted it. Then he prepared to leave the room.

24 SHE

' Stop a moment, Job,' I said. ' If Mr. Leo has no
objection, I sbotild prefer to have an independent witness
to this business, who can be reUed upon to hold his tongue
unless he is asked to speak.'

' Certainly, Uncle Horace,' answered Leo ; for I had
brought him up to caU me uncle — though he varied the
appellation somewhat disrespectfully by calling me ' old
feUow,' or even 'my avuncular relative.'

Job touched his head, not having a hat on.

' Lock the door. Job,' I said, ' and bring me my de-
spatch-box.'

He obeyed, and from the box I took the keys that poor
Vincey, Leo's father, had given me on the night of his
death. There were three of them; the largest a com-
paratively modem key, the second an exceedingly ancient
one, and the third entirely unlike anything of the sort that
we had ever seen before, being fashioned apparently from
a strip of soUd silver, with a bar placed across to serve as a
handle, and some nicks cut in the edge of the bar. It was
more like a model of some antediluvian railway key than
anything else.

' Now are you both ready ? ' I said, as people do when
they are going to fire a mine. There was no answer, so I
took the big key, rubbed some salad oil into the wards, and
after one or two bad shots, for my hands were shaking,
managed to fit it, and shoot the lock. Leo bent over and
caught the massive lid in both his hands, and with an
effort, for the hinges had rusted, leaned it back. Its re-
moval revealed another case covered with dust. This we
extracted from the iron chest without any difficulty, and
removed the accumulated filth of years from it with a
clothes-brush.

It was, or appeared to be, of ebony, or some such close-
grained black wood, and was bound in every direction with
flat bands of iron. Its antiquity must have been extreme,
for the dense heavy wood was actually in parts commencing
to crumble away from age.

' Now for it,' I said, inserting the second key.

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 25

Job and Leo bent forward in breathless silence. The
key turned, and I flung back the hd, and uttered an ex-
clamation, as did the others ; and no wonder, for iaside the
ebony case was a magnificent silver casket, about twelve
inches square by eight high. It appeared to be of Egyptian
workmanship, for the four legs were formed of Sphinxes,
and the dome-shaped cover was also surmounted by a
Sphinx. The casket was of course much tarnished and
dinted with age, but otherwise in fairly sound condition.

I drew it out and set it on the table, and then, in the
midst of the most perfect silence, I inserted the strange-
looking silver key, and pressed this way and that until at
last the lock yielded, and the casket stood open before us.
It was fiUed to the brim with some brown shredded
material, more like vegetable fibre than paper, the nature
of which I have never been able to discover. This I care-
fully removed to the depth of some three inches, when I
came to a letter enclosed in an ordinary modern-looking
envelope, and addressed ia the handwriting of my dead
friend Viacey.

' To my son Leo, should he live to o;pen this casket.'

I handed the letter to Leo, who glanced at the envelope,
and then put it down upon the table, making a motion tO
me to go on emptying the casket.

The next thing that I found was a parchment care-
fully rolled up. I unrolled it, and seeing that it was also
in Vincey's handwriting, and headed ' Translation of the
Uncial Greek Writing on the Potsherd,' put it down by the
letter. Then followed another ancient roll of parchment,
that had become yeUow and crinkled with the passage of
years. This I also unrolled. It was hkewise a transla-
tion of the same Greek original, but into black-letter Latin
this time, which at the first glance appeared to me from
the style and character to date feom somewhere about the
beginning of the sixteenth century. Immediately beneath
this roll was something hard and heavy, wrapped up in
yellow linen, and reposing upon another layer of the fibroua

26 SHE

material. Slowly and carefully we tinrolled the linen,
exposing to view a very large but undoubtedly ancient
potsherd of a dirty yellow colour 1 ^ Tliis potsherd had ia
my judgment once been a part of an ordinary amphora of
medium size. For the rest, it measured ten and a half
inches in length by seven ui width, was about a quarter of
an inch thick, and densely covered on the convex side that
lay towards the bottom of the box with writing in the later
uncial Greek character, faded here and there, but for the
most part perfectly legible, the inscription having evidently
been executed with the greatest care, and by means of a
reed pen, such as the ancients often used. I must not
forget to mention that ia some remote age this wonderful
fragment had been broken in two, and rejoined by means
of cement and eight long rivets. Also there were numerous
inscriptions on the inner side, but these were of the most
erratic character, and had clearly been made by different
hands and in many different ages, and ol them, together
with the writings on the parchments, I shall have to speak
presently.

' la there anything more ? ' asked Leo, in a kind of
excited whisper.

I groped about, and produced something hard, done
up in a little linen bag. Out of the bag we took first a
very beautiful miniature done upon ivory, and, secondly, a
small chocolate-coloured composition scarahaus, marked
thus :-—

symbols which, we have since ascertained, mean ' Suten se
Ea,' which is being translated the ' Eoyal Son of Ea or the
Sun.' The miniature was a picture of Leo's Greek mother
— a lovely, dark-eyed creature. On the back of it was
written, in poor Vincey's handwriting, ' My beloved wife.'
' That is all,' I said.

' Soc Frontispiece. — Editob.

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 27

' Very well,' answered Leo, putting down the miniature,
at which he had been gazing affectionately ; ' and now let
us read the letter,' and without further ado he broke the
seal, and read aloud as follows : —

' My Son Leo, — When you open this, if you ever live
to do so, you will have attained to manhood, and I shall
have been long enough dead to be absolutely, forgotten by
nearly all who Imew me. Yet in reading it remember that
I have been, and for anything you know may still be, and
that in it, through this link of pen and, paper, I stretch out
my hand to you across the gulf of death, and my voice
speaks to you from, the unutterable silence of the grave.
Though I am dead, and no memory of me remains in your
mind, yet am I with you in this hour that you read. Since
your birth to this day I have scarcely seen your face.
Forgive me this. Your life supplanted the life of one
whom I loved better than women are often loved, and the
bitterness of it endureth yet. Had I lived I should in time
have conquered this foolish feeling, but I am not destined
to live. My sufferings, physical and mental, are more than
I can bear, and when such small arrangements as I have
to make for your future well-being are completed it is my
intention to put a period to them. May God forgive me
if I do wrong. At the best I could not live more than
another year.'

' So he killed himself,' I exclaimed. ' I thought so.'

' And now,' Leo went on, without replying, ' enough
of myself. What has to be said belongs to you who live,
not to me, who am dead, and almost as much forgotten as
though I had never been. HoUy, my friend (to whom, if
he will accept the trust, it is my intention to confide you),
will have told you something of the extraordinary anti-
quity of your race. In the contents of this casket you
wiU find sufficient to prove it. The strange legend that
you will find inscribed by your remote ancestress upon the
potsherd was commumcated to me by my father on his
deathbed, and took a strong hold upon my imagination.

28 SHE

When I was only nineteen years of age I determined, as,
to his misfortune, did one of our ancestors about the time
of Ehzabeth, to investigate its truth. Into all that befell me
I cannot enter now. But this I saw with my own eyes. On
the coast of Africa, in a hitherto unexplored region, some
distance to the north of where the Zambesi falls into the
sea, there is a headland, at the extremityof which a peak
towers up, shaped like the head of a negro, similar to that
of which the writing speaks. I landed there, and learnt
from a wandering native, who had been cast out by his
people because of some crime which he had committed,
that far inland are great mountains, shaped like cups, and
caves surrounded by measureless swamps. I learnt also
that the people there speak a dialect of Arabic, and are
ruled over by a hea/atiful white woman who is seldom seen
by them, but who is reported to have power over all things
living and dead. Two days after I had ascertained this
the man died of fever contracted in crossing the swamps,
and I was forced by want of provisions and by symptoms of
an iUness which afterwards prostrated me to take to my
dhow again.

' Of the adventures that befell me after this I need not
now speak. I was wrecked upon the coast of Madagascar,
and rescued some months afterwards by an English ship
that brought me to Aden, whence I started for England,
intending to prosecute my search as soon as I had made
sufficient preparations. On my way I stopped in Greece,
and there, for " Omnia vincit amor," I met your beloved
mother, and married her, and there you were born and
she died. Then it was that my last illness seized me, and
I returned hither to die. But still I hoped against hope,
and set myself to work to learn Arabic, with the intention,
should I ever get better, of returning to the coast of Africa,
and solving the mystery of which the tradition has lived
so many centuries in our family. But I have not got
better, and, so far as I am concerned, the story is at an
end.

' For you, however, my son, it is not at an end, and to

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 29

you I hand on these the results of my labour, together
with the hereditary proofs of its origin. It is my intention
to provide that they shall not be put into your hands until
you have reached an age when you will be able to judge for
yourself whether or no you will choose to investigate what,
if it is true, must be the greatest mystery in the world,
or to put it by as an idle fable, originating in the first
place in a woman's disordered brain.

' I do not beheve that it is a fable ; I beheve that if it
can only be re-discovered there is a spot where the vital
forces of the world visibly exist. Life exists ; why there-
fore should not the means of preserving it indefinitely exist
also ? But I have no wish to prejudice your mind about
the matter. Eead and judge for yourself. If you are
inclined to undertake the search, I have so provided that
you will not lack for means. If, on the other hand, you
are satisfied that the whole thing is a chimera, then, I
adjure you, destroy the potsherd and the writings, and let
a cause of troubling be removed from our race for ever.
Perhaps that wiLL be wisest. The unknown is generally
taken to be terrible, not as the proverb would infer, from
the inherent superstition of man, but because it so often
is terrible. He who would tamper with the vast and
secret forces that animate the world may well fall a victim
to them. And if the end were attained, if at last you
emerged from the trial ever beautiful and ever young,
defying time and evil, and Ufted above the natural decay
of flesh and intellect, who shall say that the awesome
change would prove a happy one ? Choose, my son, and
may the Power who rules all things, and who says " thus
far shalt thou go, and thus much shalt thou learn," direct
the choice to your own happiness and the happiness of the
world, which, in the event of your success, you would one
day certainly rule by the pure force of accumulated ex-
perience. — Farewell ! '

Thus the letter, which was imsigned and undated,
abruptly ended.

30 SHE

' What do you make of that, Uncle Holly ? ' said Leo,
with a sort of gasp, as he replaced it on the table. ' We
have been looking for a mystery, and we certainly seem to
have found one.'

' What do I make of it ? Why, that your poor dear
father was off hi^ head, of course,' I answered, testily.
' I guessed as much that night, twenty years ago, when
■he came into my room. You see he evidently hurried his
own end, poor man. It is absolute balderdash.'

' That's it, sir ! ' said Job, solemnly. Job was a most
matter-of-fact specimen of a matter-of-fact class.

' Well, let's see what the potsherd has to say, at any
rate,' said Leo, taking up the translation ia his father's
writing, and commencing to read : —

'I, Amenartas, of the Boy al House of the Pharaohs of
Egypt, wife of Kallikrates (the Beautiful ia Strength), a
Priest of Isis whom the gods cherish and the demons obey,
being about to die, to my little son Tisisthenes (the Mighty
Avenger). I fled with thy father from Egypt in the days
of Nectanebes,^ causing him through love to break the vows
that he had vowed. We fled southward, across tJie waters,
and we wandered for twice twelve moons on the coast oj
Libya (Africa) that looks towards the rising sun, where by
a river is a great rock carven like the head of an Ethiopian.
Four days on the water from the mouth of a mighty river
ware toe cast away, and some ivere drowned and some died
of sickness. But us wild men took through wastes and
marshes, where the sea fowl hid the sky, bearing us ten
days' joxirney till we came to a liollow mountain, where a
great city had been and fallen, and where there are caves
of luhich no man hath seen the end ; and they broiight us
to the Queen of the people who place pots upon the heads
of strangers, who is a magician having a knowledge of all
things, arid life and loveliness that does not die. And she
cast eyes of love upon thy father, Kallikrates, and would

' Nekht-nebf, or Neotanebo II., tlie last native Pharaoli of Egypt
fled from Ochus to Ethiopia, ns.o. 330. — Editoe.

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 31

have slain me, and taken him to husband, but he loved me
and feared her, and would not. Then did she taJce us, and
lead us by terrible tvays, by means ■qf darh magic, to where
the great fit is, in the mouth of which the old philosopher
lay dead, and showed to us the rolling Pillar of Life that
dies not, whereof the voice is as the voice of thunder ; and
she did stand in the flames, and conie forth unharmed, and
yet more beautiful. Then did she swear to make thy father
undying even as she is, if he would but slay me, and give
himself to her, for me she could not slay because of the
magic of my own people that I have, and that prevailed
thus far against her. And he held his hand before his
eyes to hide her beauty, and would not. Then in her rage
did she smite him by her magic, and he died; btit she- wept
over him, and bore him thence with lamentations : and
being afraid, me she sent to the mouth of the great river
luhere the ships come, and I was carried far away on the
ships where I gave thee birth, and hither to Athens I came
at last after many wanderings. Now I say to thee, my
son, Tisisthenes, seek out the woman, and learn the secret
of Life, and if thou may est find a way slay her, because of
thy father Kallikrates ; and if thou dost fear or fail, this I
say to all of thy seed who come after thee, till at last a
brave man be found ajnong them who shall bathe in the
fire and sit in the place of the Pharaohs. I speak of tliose
things, that though they be past belief, yet I have known,
and I lie not.'

' May the Lord forgive lier for that,' groaned Job, who
had been listening to this marvellous composition with his
mouth open.

As for myself, I said nothing : my first idea being that
my poor friend, being demented, had composed the whole
thing, though it scarcely seemed likely that such a story
could have been invented by anybody. It was too original.
To solve my doubts I took up the potsherd and began
to read the close uncial Greek writing on it ; and very good
Greek of the period it is, considering that it came from

32 SHE

the pen of an Egyptian bom. Here is an exact transcript
ofit:—

AMENAPTAZTOYBAZIAIKOYrENOYZTOYA
irYrXIOYHTOYKAAAIKPATOYZIZIAOZlEP
EnZHNOIMENeEOITPE<l>OYZITAAEAAIMO
NIAYPOTAZZETAIHAHTEAEYTnZATIZIZ
GENEITnPAIAIEriZTEAAEITAAEZYNE<|)YrO
NrAPrOTEEKTHZAirYrXIAZEPJNEKTANEB
OYM ETATOYZOYP ATPOZAI ATON EPflTATO
N EMON EriOPKHZANTOZ<I>YrONTEZAErPO
ZNOTONAIAPONTIOIKAIKAMHNAZKATATA
rAPAeAAAZZfATHZAIBYHZTAPPOZHAlOY
ANATOAAZPAANHGENTEZENeAPEPPETPA
TIZMErAAHrAYPTONOMOiriMAAieiOPOZ
KE<I>A AHZ EITA H M EPAZAAPOZTOM ATOZPO
TAMOYMEPAAOYEKPEZONTEZOIMENKATE
PONTIZeHMENOIAENOZfllAPEeANOMENT
EAOZAEYPArPinNAN0PnPnNE«l>EPOMEeA
AlAEAEHNTEKAITENArEnNENeAPEPPTHN
r^NPAHeOZAPOKPYPTEITONOYPANONHM
EPAZIEnZHAeOMENEIZKOIAONTIOPOZEN
GAPOTEM EPA AH M EN PO AIZHN ANTPAAEAP
EIPONAHfArONAEnZBAZIAEIANTHNTnNE
ENOYZXYTPAIZZTE<l>ANOYNTnNHTIZMArE
IAMENEXPHTOEPIZTHMHAEPANTI2NKAIA
H KAI KAAAOZKAIPnMHN APHPHZHNHAEKA
AAIKPATOYZTOYZOYPATPOZEPAZGEIZAT
OMENPPnXONZYNOIKEINEBOYAETOEMEA
EANEAEINEPEITAnZOYKANEPEIGENEMEPA
PYPEPE«l>IAEIKAITHNZENHNE<l)OBEITOAPH
PAPENH MAZYPOMAPEIAZKAGOAOYZZiDAA
EPAZENGATOBAPAGPONTOMEPAOYKATAZ
TOMAEKEITOOrEPnNO<l>IAOZO<l>OZTEQNE
nZA<l>IKOMENOIZAEAEIHE«l>r2ZTOYBIOYEY
GYOIONKIONAEAIZZOMENON4)nNHNIENT
AKAGAPEPBPONTHZEITAAIAPYPOZBEBHK
YIAABAABHZKAIETIKAAAinNAYTHEAYTHZ
EiE<I>ANHEKAETOYTnNnMOZEKAITONZO
NPATEPAAGANATONAPOAEIHEINEIZYNOIK
EINOIBOYAOITOEMEAEANEAEINOYPAPOY
NAYTHANEAEINIZXYENYPOTHN HMEAAPfl
NHN KAI AYTH EXfi M APEI AZOAOYAENTI MA

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 33

AAONHeEAETHXEIPETONOMMATXlNrPOl
SXnNINAAHTOTHZrYNAlKOZKAAAOZMH
OPIlHEPEITAOPriZeEIZAKATErOHTEYZEM
ENAYTONArOAOMENONMENTOIKAAOYZA
KAIOAYPOMENHEKEIGENAPHNErKENEMEA
E<l>OBniA<!>HKENEIZZTOMATOYMErAAOYr
OTAMOYTOYNAYZirOPOYPOPPflAENAYZI
NE<l>r2NrEPPAEOYZAETEKONZEArorAEYZ
AZAMOAIZPOTEAEYPOAeHNAZEKATHrAr
OMHNZYAEnTIZIZGENEZnNEPIZTEAAnM
HOAirnPEIAEIPAPTHNrYNAIKAANAZHTEl
NHNPnZTOTOYBtOYMYZTHPIONANEYPH
SKAIANAIPEINHNPOYPAPAZXHAIATONZO
NPATEPAKAAAIKPATHNEIAE<I)OBOYMENO
ZHAIAAAAOTIAYTOZAEIPEITOYEPrOYPA
ZITOIZYZTEPONAYTOTOYTOEPIZTEAAnE
nZPOTEArAGOZTIZPENOMENOZTIlPYPIA
OYZAZ©AITOAMHZEIKAITAAPIZTEIAEXI2N
BAZIAEYZAimNANGPnPnNAPIZTAMENA
HTATOIAYTAAErnOMilZAEAAYTHErNriK
AOYKES'EYZAMHN

For general eonvenienoe in reading, I have here accu-
rately transcribed this inscription into the cursive cha-
racter : —

^AfievapTaSf tov ^aaiXixoD jsvovs tov Alyvir-
Tiov, Tf TOV JLaWiKpdrovs "IcnSos Ispiios, rjv 01 fisv
dsol Tps(j)Ovai, ra Bs Bai/j,6via v'irord<rasTai, rjBr) ts\,~
svToxra Ticncrffsvsi t&5 iraiSl EiricrTaXksi, rdBs ' crvvs-
(jjvyov yap iroTS etc rrjs AlyvTrrias iirl NsKrave^ov
fLSTO, TOV <rov iraTpos, Bia tov spcoTa tov iubv kiriop-
KrjcravTos. tpvyovTSS Bs Trpos votov BiairovTiob Koi k'B'
fj,rjvas KUTO, Ta TrapadaXaaaia ttjs Aifivris to. nrpos
-fjfKlov avaToXas irKavi^divTSS, svOairspirsTpa tis /MsydXij,
yXvTTTov 6fiOL0)/jt,a AWIottos KScfioXrjs, slTa rjfiipas B'
diro CTTOfiuTos "TTOTafiov fisjdXov SKirsaovTSs, 01 jjisv
KaTSVOVTio-dnj/isv, 01 Bs voao) dirsOdvofiSV ' tsXos Bs
vtt' dypiav dvdpcinrcov i(psp6fis6a Bt,^ sKswv ts koL

D

34 SHE

TSvaySccv evOairsf) tttijv&v "ttXtjOos airoKpvTrrsi rov
ovpavov, rjfjjipas i, sas ijXdofLsv sis koTKov ti opos, kvda
TTOTe /j-syaXr) filv iroKis ^v, avTpa Se dirsipova ' rjyajov
Se Q3S ^aa-lXsiav Trjv t&v ^svovs '^vrpais arscfiavovvTcov,
^Tis fiwysia fjLsV s')(prJTO siriarrifLri Ss irdvTWV KaX Brj Kal
KoXkos Kal pcofJ/r]V dyijpcos ^V t; SI K-aWlKparovs
Tov crov irarpos kpacBsiaa to fj,sv irp&Tov avvouKstv
k^ovKsTO hfis Bs dvsKelv sirsira, ms ovk dvsirst.Oev,
Sfjt,^ r/dp virsps^lXsi, KoX TTjv ^sv7]V scfto^siTO, dinjjar/sv
Tjiids viro fiajsias Kad' oSovs acljaXspas svOa to ^d-
paOpov TO p^i'^a, o5 KaTd aTO/ia sksito 6 '•^ipcov 6
(f>i\,6ero(f>os TeQvews,, dcf>iKo/j,svois B' sSsi^s tfySis tov
^lov svdv, otov KLOva £\i<ra'6p,svov i^tovqv iivTa Kuddirep
^povTrjs, SITU Bid irvpos 0e^7]KVia d^a^rjs koX etc
KaWlwv avTTj kavTrjs i^stpdvr]. etc Be tovtcov &p,o(7s
Kal TOV abv iraTipa dOdvaTov diroBsl^siv, si crvvoiKSiv
oi l3ov\oiTO ip,^ Ss dvsXstv, oil yap oZv avTrj dvs\slv
I'crjjjvsi' inro t&v rjpsBair&v rjv Kal avTr) s')(oi p,aysias,
6 B' ovBsv Tt paXkov f)6sKs, t& "Xfip^ '''^^ oppaTcov
•Kpo[(T')(cov Xva Brj TO Trjs yvvaiK6S xdWos prj opwrj '
sirsiTa opyicrOsura KaTsyoj]Tsvas p,sv avTov, diroXop.svov
p,sVTOi Kkdovcra Kal oBvpop.svr} sksWsv dir'^vayKsv, ipe
Be (j)6^q) dcf)r]KSV sis (JT6p,a tov psyakov iroTapov
TOV vavaiiropov, iroppa Bs vavcriv, i(j>' Sivirsp irKsovaa
STSKOV (TS, diroTrKsvcracra pLoXis ttotI Bsvpo 'A0T]vd^s
KaTriyayopnp). (7v Bi, w TicrtcrOsvss, &v STTia-TsSXco prj
oXtycopsi, • BsL yap Trjv yvvaiKa dva^rjTSiv fjv iras to tov
/3lov piv(7Trjpiop dvsvprjs, Kai avaipsiv, rjv ttov Trapacryn,
Bid TOV trov iraTspa K.aXXiKpaTrjPi si Bs ^o^ovpsvos
r) Bid aXXo Ti avTos Xshrei tov spyov, irdcn toIs
vaTspov avTo tovto eTrio-TgWo), ecus ttote dyados tls
ysvopsvos T§3 irvpl Xovaaadai ToXp^asi Kalrd dpiarTsia
s-)(aiv ^aaiXsvcrai t5>v dvdptoTrcov ' airia-Ta p,sv Br) to.
TOiavTa Xiyco, op-ms Si d avTrj 'iyvwKa ovk i^jrsva-dprjv.

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 35

The English translation was, as I discovered on further
investigation, and as the reader may easily see by oompari-
Bon, both accurate and elegant.

Besides the uncial writing on the convex side of the
sherd at the top, painted in dull red, on what had once
been the lip of the amphora, was the cartouche already
mentioned as being on the sca/rabaus, which we had also
found in the casket. The hieroglyphics or symbols, how-
ever, were reversed, just as though they had been pressed
on wax. Whether this was the cartouche of the original
KaUikrates,' or of some Prince or Pharaoh fi:om whom his
wife Amenartas was descended, I am not sure, nor can I
tell if it was drawn upon the sherd at the same time that
the uncial Greek was inscribed, or copied on more recently
from the Scarab by some other member of the family.
Nor was this aU. At the foot of the writing, pamted in the
same dull red, was the faint outline of a somewhat rude
drawing of the head and shoulders of a Sphinx wearing
two feathers, symbols of majesty, which, though common
enough upon the effigies of sacred bulls and gods, I have
never before met with on a Sphinx.

Also on the right-hand side of this surface of the sherd,
painted obUquely in red on the space not covered by the
uncial, and signed in blue paint, was the following quaint
inscription : —

IN EAETH AND SKIE AND SEA
BTEANGB THYNGES THEB BE.
HOC TBOIT

DOBOTHEA VINOET.

Perfectly bewildered, I turned the relic over. It was
covered from top to bottom with notes and signatures in
Greek, Latin, and English. The first in uncial Greek was
by Tisisthenes, the son to whom the writing was addressed.

' The cartouche, if it be a true cartouche, cannot have been that
of Kallila-ates, as Mr. Holly suggests. Kallikrates was a priest and
not entitled, to a cartouche, which was the prerogative of Egyptian
royalty, though he might have inscribed his name or title upon an
oval. — Ediiok.

D 2

36 SHE

It was, ' I could not go. Tisisthenes to Ms son, Eallikrates.'
Here it is in fac-simile with its cursive equivalent : —

OYKANAYNAI M HNPOPEYECQAITICICeENH
CKA A Al KPATEITm H Ar Al

ovK hv Bvvalfi7]v iropevsaOai.

TiaiaOevris 'KaWiKparsi tS iraiBi.

This KaUikrates (probably, in the Greek fashion, so
named after his grandfather) evidently made some attempt
to start on the quest, for his entry written in very faint and
almost illegible uncial is, 'I ceased from my going, the
gods being against me, KaUikrates to his son.' Here it is
also : —

TXlNQEnNANTIZTANTriNErAYZAMHNTHZ
rOPEIAZKAAAIKPATHZTIllPAIAI

Tcov 6s5iv avTiaravTcov STravadfirjv t^s iropsias.
KxiX\,iKpdT7)s Tw iraiBi.

Between these two ancient writings, the second of which
was inscribed upside down and was so faint and worn
that, had it not been for the transcript of it executed by
Vincey, I should scarcely have been able to read it, since,
owing to its having been written on that portion of the tile
which had, in the course of ages, undergone the most hand-
ling, it was nearly rubbed out — was the bold, modem-look-
ing signature of one Lionel Vincey, ' ^tate sua 17,' which
was written thereon, I think, by Leo's grandfather. To the
right of this were the initials ' J. B. V.,' and below came a
variety of Greek signatures, in uncial and cursive character,
and what appeared to be some carelessly executed repeti-
tions of the sentence ' rj» iraiii ' (to my son), showing that
the relic was religiously passed on from gcnerStion to
generation.

The next legible thing after the Greek signatures was
the word ' Eomab, a.u.o.,' showing that the family had
now migrated to Eome. Unfortunately, however, with the

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 37

exception of its termination (cvi) the date of their settle-
ment there is for ever lost, for just where it had been placed
a piece of the potsherd is broken away.

Then folio-wed twelve Latia signatures, jotted about
here and there, wherever there was a space upon the tile
suitable to their inscription. These signatures, with three
exceptions only, ended with the name ' Viadex ' or ' the
Avenger,' which seems to have been adopted by the family
after its migration to Eome as a kind of equivalent to
the Grecian' Tisisthenes,' which also means an avenger.
Ultimately, as might be expected, this Latin cognomen of
Viadex was transformed first into De Vincey, and then into
the plain, modern Vincey. It is very curious to observe
how the idea of revenge, inspired by an Egjrptian before
the time of Christ, is thus, as it were, embalmed in an
English family name.

A few of the Eoman names inscribed upon the sherd I
have actually since found mentioned in history and other
records. They were, if I remember right,

MVSSIVS. VINDEX

SEX. TABIVS. MAETLLVS

0. rVEIDIVS. 0. F. VINDEX

and

LABEEU POMPEIANA. OONITX. MAOKINI. VINDIOIS

the last being, of course, the name of a Eoman lady.

The following Hst, however, comprises all the Latin
names upon the sherd : —

C. OAECILIVB VINDEX

M. AIMUiIVS TINDEX

SEX. VAKIVS. MABVLLVS

Q. SOSIVS PKISCVS SENECIO VINDEX

I,. VAIEEITS COMINIVS VINDEX
u EEX. OTAOILITS. M. 1.

^ 1. ATTITS. VINDEX

MVSSIVS VINDEX

C. rVFIDITS. 0. F. VINDEX

MCINIVS TAVSIVS

LABEEIA POMPEIANA CONIVX MAOEINl VINDI0I8

MANIXilA LVCILLA CONIVX MAEVLLl VINDIOIS

38 SHE

After the Eoman names there is evidently a gap of very
many centuries. Nobody will ever know now what was the
history of the relic during those dark ages, or how it came
to have been preserved in the family. My poor friend Vincey
had, it will be remembered, told me that his Eoman ances-
tors finally settled in Lombardy, and when Charlemagne
invaded it, returned with him across the Alps, and made
their home in Brittany, whence they crossed to England
in the reign of Edward the Confessor. How he knew this
I am not aware, for there is no reference to Lombardy or
Charlemagne upon the tUe, though, as wiU presently be
seen, there is a reference to Brittany. To continue : the
next entries on the sherd, if I may except a long splash
either of blood or red colouring matter of some sort, con-
sist of two crosses drawn in red pigment, and probably
representing Crusaders' swords, and a rather neat mono-
gram (' D. V.') in scarlet and blue, perhaps executed by
that same Dorothea Vincey who wrote, or rather painted,
the doggrel couplet. To the left of this, inscribed in
faint blue, were the initials A. V., and after them a date,
1800.

Then came what was perhaps as curious an entry as
anything upon this extraordinary relic of the past. It is
executed in black letter, written over the crosses or
Crusaders' swords, and dated fourteen hundred and forty-
five. As the best plan will be to allow it to speak for itself,
I here give the black-letter fac- simile, together with the
original Latin without the contractions, from which it wiU
be seen that the writer was a fair mediceval Latinist. Also
we discovered what is still more curious, an EngUsh ver-
sion of the black-letter Latin. This, also written in black-
letter, we found inscribed on a second parchment that was
in the coffer, apparently somewhat older in date than that
on which was inscribed the mediaBval Latin translation
of the uncial Greek of which I shall speak presently. This
I also give in full.

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 39

Facsimile of BlacJc-Letter Inscription on the Sherd of
Amenartas.

<g|fta rriiqia eft taltie miftim tt mprificb
^ op^ ^b niaiore^ met ej; Sllrmorica IT
2Si-ittania miore fecit tWatf^that et q&m (c^
cleric^ fepcc Jri meo in manb ferefiat QiJ
peitu^ iHiiti beftciicrct affinnajef qb efTet afi
ipfo fatljaita coffatto jjtreftigiofa et Jspaltotica
arte qrc ptec m€o^ cofregit iilbb t bijajS pte^
Qjf qbm ego Si's!? be ailiceto falba^ fetbatJi et
abaptatit ficijt apjjaret bie ifie pit poft feft Iieate.
Static birg anni gf e mccccjiib

^Expanded Version of the above Black-Letter Inscription,

' IsTA reliquia est valde misticum et myrificiim opus,
quod majores mei ex Armorica, scilicet Britannia Minora,
secum convehebant ; et quidam sanctus clericus semper
patri meo in manu ferebat quod penitus Ulud destrueret,
affirmans quod esset ab ipso Satliana conflatum prestigiosa
et dyabolica arte, quare pater meus confregit illud in duaa
partes, quas quidem ego Johannes de Viaceto salvas
servavi et adaptavi sicut apparet die lune proximo post
festum beate Marie Virginis anni gratie MCCCCXLV.

Facsimile of the Old English Blach-Letter Translation
of the above Latin Inscription from the Sherd of
Amenartas found inscribed upon a parchment.

l[)li^ rcllifte p^ a rpgijte miftpcall itjorfte
^ a niarijcpiouisf p^ tDi^pcfje mpne abn^
ttttxt^ afore tpnie bpb conijcigfje ijiber tu' pm
ffrom 5llrmbrplte My^ p^ to fcicn 25ntapne p^
Icffe $c a certapne fjoJpe ricrlte fijoiitbe alllwepc^
Ijearc mp ffabit on gcnbe p^ ific olugijte tjttirip

40 SHE

ffor to fftufffje p^ fame affiirmpnge p* pt ItjajS
ftourmnt! ^ confflatpti off fatl^anaiS Ijpm fcWc
lip arte ttiagtfee ^ EipijcHpirdc tufjcrcforc mp
ffabit: &pD tafec p^ fame Sc to firatt pt pit tlucpnc
But % Slol^ntjc Slinfcp ttpti fatciuljool p"^ tiucpc
5tc^ tficrof $c topcccpb p'« togptstscr agapnc foe
ajf ^ct fc on p^ bcpe montiape ncjrt ffololupngc
after p^ ffccfte of fcpnte Sifarpe p^ bicITcb
tprgpne pn p^ ^ttxz of faibaciaiut ffolycttcnc
Jjuntirctij & ffp^e ^ ffolurti.

Modernised Version of the above Black Letter
Translation.

Thys rellike ys a ryghte mistycall ■worbe and a mar-
vaylous, ye wliyohe myne aunceteres aforetyme dyd eon-
veigb hider •with them from Armoryke which ys to seien
Britaine ye Lesse and a certayne holye clerke should all-
weyes beare my fadir on honde that he owghte uttirly for
to frusshe ye same, affyrmynge that yt was fourmed and
conflatyd of Sathanas hym selfe by arte magike and dyvel-
lyssbe wherefore my fadir dyd take ye same and tobrast yt
yn tweyne, but I, John de Vincey, dyd save whool ye tweye
partes therof and topeecyd them togydder agayne soe as yee
se, on this daye mondaye next foUowynge after ye feeste of
Seynte Marye ye Blessed Vyrgjme yn ye yeere of Salvaoioun
fowertene hundreth and fyve and fowerti.'

The next and, save one, last entry was Elizabethan,
and dated 1564, ' A most strange historie, and one that did
cost my father his Hfe ; for in seeltynge for the place upon
the east coast of Africa, his pinnance was sunk by a
Portuguese galleon off Lorenzo Marquez, and he himself
perished. — John Vincet.'

Then came the last entry, apparently, to jtidge by the
style of writing, made by some representative of the family
in the middle of the eighteenth century. It was a mis.
quotation of the well-known lines in Hamlet, and ran thus :

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 41

' There are more things in Heaven and earth than are
dreamt of in your philosophy, Horatio.' *

And now there remained but one more document to be
examined — namely, the ancient black-letter translation into
medisBval Latin of the uncial inscription on the sherd. As
wiU be seen, this translation was executed and subscribed
i'l the year 1495, by a certain 'learned man,' Edmundus de
Prato (Edmund Pratt) by name, licentiate in Canon Law,
of Exeter College, Oxford, who had actually been a pupil
of Grocyn, the first scholar who taught Greek in England.^
No doubt on the fame of this new learning reaching his
ears, the Vincey of the day, perhaps that same John de
Vincey who years before had saved the relic from destruc-
tion and made the black-letter entry on the sherd in 1445,
hurried off to Oxford to see if perchance it might avail to
solve the secret of the mysterious inscription. Nor was he
disappointed, for the learned Edmundus was equal to the
task. Indeed his rendering is so excellent an example of
mediaeval learning and latinity that, even at the risk of
sating the learned reader with too many antiquities, I have
made up my mind to give it ia fac-simile, together with
an expanded version for the beneiit of those who find the
contractions troublesome. The translation has several
peculiarities on which this is not the place to dwell, but
I would in passing call the attention of scholars to the
passage ' duxerunt autem nos ad reginam advenaslasanis-
coronantium,' which strikes me as a delightful rendering of
the original, ' riyayov 8e (US jJaxTiXeiav T^v tw ^evous -}(yTpai.i
are^avovVTOiV. '

' Another thing that mates me fix the date of this entry at the
middle of the eighteenth century is that, curiously enough, I have
an acting copy of ' Hamlet,' written about 1740, in which these two
lines are misquoted almost exactly in the same way, and I have
little doubt but that the Vincey who wrote them on the potsherd
heard them so misquoted at that date. Of course, the lines really
run : —

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy — L. H. H.
' Grocyn, the instructor of Erasmus, studied Greek under Chal-
condylas the Byzantine at Florence, and first lectured in the Hall of
Exeter College, Oxford, in 1491. — ^Epitor.

42 Sim

MedicBval Black Letter Latin Translation of the Uncial
Inscription on the Sherd of Amena/rtas.

^menarta^ e gen. rcg. €gpptii \iXfit Cal-
'^ iicmti^ facerbof %^\\n^ qua isci folift
tjcinonia attebijt ffiiol' ftjo €ifift||mi ia mori^
Bnba ita ma&at : <SfEugi quo&a cjc €gppto
rcgiiatc l^cttancfio cii patre tbo, ypter mci
amore j>ejemto. :3pligiete^ ante b'fu^ ^otu
trajijSf marc et jcjciiij mefc^ ji't iitora Eibyc
b'fujef (©riete erranf isBi eft pctca qiic&a mgna
ftblpta inftai: oStljiop capif, Jjcinbe bie^ iii; ali
off ffum nigni decti p'tini fubmcrfi fumit.sf
p'tim morlio mortiii fum : in fine ante n fcE
lymb^ porta&amin: pr paiiiS et tiaba, ij&i nliiii
m'titttJO cclii oBSSrat bie^ jr. bonce abicnim ab
taiJU qutba montc, uBi olini mgita tJi'lj^ crat,
caucrnc quoq imcfe : blix'crut aittc no^ ab rcgina
^bucnaf iarnni.^coronatiu que magic tteltair tt
pcritia cmniu rcc ct faitc pijkrii et bigocc
ifccfciOil' tmt, i^ec mgno pate tui amore
pcblfiEfa p'mu q'bl ci conuBiu miclji mortc
paral&at. poftca b'ro rccbfatc Caiiicrate amore
mci et timorc rcgine affccto no^ pr mngiea
afibujrit p'r Ijia^ liorriSii' bfii eft putcusf iiic
pfubu^, cuius? iujcta abitu iaceljat fcnio£ p!jilo-
fopl^i cabaucr, et abijcictiti moftraijit ffafiia
JUite crccta, iftar cclumne ijoiutati^, ijocc^
emittcte ^fi tonitrljjS : tuc pr ignc fpctu ncciiia
cjrpcriS trafiit ct ia ipa fcfc formofior Viifa eft.
€}uiS fad iurabtt fc patre tuu quoq imcr^

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 43

tatc oftcfura t^t^ ft me priu^ occifa rcgine
cotijBmiiu maWct; acq cni ipfa me occibere
i^aiiiit, P3?tcr noftratii mgica tuiuif cgomet
ptcm IjaBco. Sl'f'f^ ^ctro nici^il fjuiu^ gcft
inaiuit, manift ante ocitt palTijef ite muiicc
formofttate a&fpjcecet : poftca eu mgica pcultit
arte, at mortuu cffereBat fbe cuffetiii tt loagitiB,
me pr timore ejtpuiit ab oftiu mgiii ffmnift
ijeliuoli jjorro in nate in qua te ''^ti^txx^ uij:
poft tric^ pc SUtljcna^ intecta fu. %t tu, <©
'Cififtlicn, ne q'b quoru matso nauci fat : nccelTc
cm eft muiicrc ej^giJirere ft qija JUite myftetiu
Tpette^ et ijl&icate, quatu in te eft, patce tiiu
Cailictaf in regine mortc* J»in timote feu aiig
caijfa re rciiquiiSf ifecta, ijoc ij>(u oifi poftcr
maDo bu IJoniJiSf q^ intjeniatm: qlji igiti^s iauacru
no prljorrcfcet tt ptcntia bijjn boiabii piu.

^ 'Caiia bico incrcbiljilia qbe at mite ficta be
refi micl)i cognitiisf.

^tt <i5rcce jfttipta Htatine rcbbibit tic
boctu^ dEbmbjS be ^rato, in "^ttttiv^ %U
ccntiatu^ e Coil. <!Ejton: <©jton: boctijaf^imi
ijBtotpni quonbam e ptipilii^, Si^. tUpr. ^^

Exjpanded Version of the above Mediczval Latin
Translation.
Amenaetas, e genere regio Bgyptii, uxor Callicratis, sacer-
dotis Isidis, quam dei fovent demonia attendunt, filiolo
suo Tisistheni jam moribunda ita mandat : Effugi quondam
ex Egypto, regnante Nectanebo, cum patre tuo, propter mei
amorem pejerato. Fugientes autem verisus Notum trans
mare, et viginti quatuor menses per litora Libj'e versus

44 SHE

Orientem errantes, ubi est petra quedam magna sculpta
instar Ethiopia capitis, deinde dies quatuor ab ostio fluminis
magni ejecti partim submersi sumus partim morbo mortui
sumus : in fine autem a feris hominibus portabamur per
paludes et vada, ubi avium multitude celum obumbrat, dies
decern, donee advenimus ad cavum quendam montem, uib
olim magna urbs erat, caverne quoque immense ; duxerunt
autem nos ad reginam Advenaslasaniscoronantium, que
magici utebatur et peritid omnium rerum, et saltem pul-
critudine et vigore iasenescibilis erat. Hec magno patris
tui amore perculsa, primum quidem ei connubium micbi
mortem parabat ; postea vero, recusante OaUicrate, amore
mei et timore regine affecto nos per magicam abduxit per
vias horribiles ubi est puteus ille profundus, cujus juxta
aditum jacebat senioris pbilosopbi cadaver, et advenien-
tibus monstravit flammam Vite erectam, instar columne
volutantis, voces emittentem quasi tonitrus : tune per ignem
impetu nocivo expers transiit et jam ipsa sese formosior
visa est.

Quibus factis juravit se patrem tuum quoque immor-
talem ostensuram esse, si me prius ocoisa regiae contuber-
nium mallet ; neque enim ipsa me occidere valuit, propter
nostratum magicam cujus egomet partem habeo. Ille vero
nichil hujus generis malebat, manibus ante oculos passis,
ne mulieris formositatem adspiceret : postea Ulum magica
percussit arte, at mortuum efferebat iade cum fletibus et
vagitibus, at me per timorem expulit ad ostium magni flu-
minis, velivoli, porro in nave, in qua te peperi, vix post
dies hue Athenas vecta sum. At tu, Tisistbenes, ne quid
quorum mando nauci fac : necesse enim est mulierem ex-
quirere si qua Vite mysterium impetres et vindicare, quan-
tum ia te est, patrem tuum Callicratem in regine morte.
Sin timore seu aliqua causa rem relinquis infectam, hoc
ipsum omnibus posteris mando, dum bonus quis iaveniatur
qui ignis lavacrum non perhorrescet, et potentia dignua
domiaabitur homiaum.

Talia dico incredibilia quidem at miiiime ficta de rebus
michi cognitis.

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 4S

Heo Grece soripta Latine reddidit vir dootus Edmimdus
de Prato, in Decretis Licenciatus, e CoUegio Exoniensi
Oxoniensi doctissimi Grocyni quondam e pupillis, Idibus
ApriUs Anno Domini MCCCCLXXXXV°.

' Well,' I said, -when at length I had read out and care-
fully examined these writings and paragraphs, at least those
of them that were still easily legible, ' that is the conclu-
sion of the whole matter, Leo, and now you can form your
own opinion on it. I have already formed mine.'

' And what is it ? ' he asked, in his quick way.

' It is this. I believe that potsherd to be perfectly
genuine, and that, wonderful as it may seem, it has come
down in your family from since the fourth century before
Christ. The entries absolutely prove it, and therefore,
however improbable it may seem, it must be accepted. But
there I stop. That your remote ancestress, the Egyptian
princess, or some scribe under her direction, wrote that
which we see on the sherd I have no doubt, nor have I
the sUghtest doubt but that her sufferings and the loss of
her husband had turned her head, and that she was not
right in her mind when she did write it.'

' How do you account for what my father saw and heard
there ? ' asked Leo.

' Coincidence. No doubt there are bluffs on the coast
of Africa that look something like a man's head, and
plenty of people who speak bastard Arabic. Also, I believe
that there are lots of swamps. Another thing is, Leo,
and I am sorry to say it, but I do not believe that your
poor father was quite right when he wrote that letter.
He had met with a great trouble, and also he had allowed
this story to prey on his imagination, and he was a very
imaginative man. Anyway, I beUeve that the whole thing
is the most unmitigated rubbish. I know that there are
curious things and forces in nature which we rarely meet
with, and, when we do meet them, cannot understand. But
until I see it with my own eyes, which I am not Ukely to,
I never will beheve that there is -any means of avoiding

46 SHE

death, even for a time, or that there is or was a white
sorceress living in the heart of an African swamp. It is
hosh, my boy, all bosh ! — What do you say, Job ? '

' I say, sir, that it is a lie, and, if it is true, I hope Mr.
Leo won't meddle with no such things, for no good can't
come of it.'

' Perhaps you are both right,' said Leo, very quietly.
' X express no opinion. But I say this. I am going to set
the matter at rest once and for all, and if you won't come
with me I will go by myself.'

I looked at the young man, and saw that he meant
what he said. When Leo me^ns what he says he always
puts on a curious look abotft the mouth. It has been a
trick of his from a child. Now, as a matter of fact, I had
no intention of allowing Leo to go anywhere by himself, for
my own sake, if not for his. I was far too much attached
to him for that. I am not a man of many ties or affections.
Circumstances have been against me in this respect, and
men and women shrink from me, or, at least, I fancy they
do, which comes to the same thing, thinking, perhaps, that
my somewhat forbidding exterior is a key to my character.
Eather than endure this, I have, to a great extent, secluded
myself from the world, and cut myself off from those oppor-
tunities which with most men result in the formation of
relations more or less intimate. Therefore Leo was all
the world to me — brother, child, and friend — and until he
wearied of me, where he went there I should go too. But,
of course, it would not do to let him see how great a hold
he had over me ; so I cast at)Out for some means whereby
I might let myself down easy.

' Yes, I sh all go. Uncle ; and if I don't find the ' ' rolling
Pillar of Life," at any rate I shall get some first-class
shooting.'

Here was my opportunity, and I took it.

' Shooting ? ' I said. ' Ah ! yes ; I never thought of
that. It must be a very wild stretch of country, and full
of big game. I have always wanted to kill a buffalo before
I die. Do you know, my boy, I don't believe in the quest,

THE SHERD OF AMENARTAS 47

but I do believe in big game, and really, on the •wliole, if,
after thinking it over, you make up your mind to go, I will
take a holiday, and come with you.'

' Ah,' said Leo, ' I thought that you would not lose such
a chance. But how about money ? We shall want a good
lot.'

' You need not trouble about that,' I answered. ' There
is all your income that has been accumulating for years,
and besides that I have saved two-thirds of what your
father left to me, as I consider, in trust for you. There is
plenty of cash.'

' Very well, then, we may as well stow these things
away and go up to town to see about our guns. By the
way. Job, are you coming too ? It's time you began to see
the world.'

' Well, sir,' answered Job, stolidly, ' I don't hold much
with foreign parts, but if both you gentlemen are going you
will want somebody to look after you, and I am not the
man to stop behind after serving you for twenty years.'

' That;s right. Job,' said I. ' You won't find out any-
thing wonderful, but you will get some good shooting. And
ntiw look here, both of you. I won't have a word said to a
living soul about this nonsense,' and I pointed to the pot-
sherd. ' If it got out, and anything happened to me, my
nest of kin would dispute my will on the ground of insanity,
and I should become the laughing stock of Cambridge.'

That day three months we were on the ocean, bound
for Zanzibar,

48 SHE

IV.

THE SQUALL.

How different is the scene that I have now to tell from that
■which has just been toldl Gone are the quiet college
rooms, gone the wind-swayed EngHsh elms and cawing
rooks, and the familiar volumes on the shelves, and in their
place there rises a vision of the great calm ocean gleaming
in shaded silver lights beneath the beams of the full African
moon. A gentle breeze fills the huge sail of our dhow, and
draws us through the water that ripples musically against
our sides. Most of the men are sleeping forward, for it
is near midnight, but a stout swarthy Arab, Mahomed by
name, stands at the tiller, lazily steering by the stars.
Three miles or more to our starboard is a low dim line. It
is the Eastern shore of Central Africa. We are rumiing to
the southward, before the North BastTSIonsoon, between
the mainland and the reef that for hundreds of miles fringes
that perilous coast. The night is quiet, so quiet that a
whisper can be heard fore £4nd aft the dhow ; so quiet that
a faint booming sound roUs across the water to us from
the distant land.

The Arab at the tiller holds up his hand, and says one
word : — ' Simba (Uon) ! '

We all sit up and hsten. Then it comes again, a slow,
majestic sound, that thriUs us to the marrow.

' To-morrow by ten o'clock,' I say, ' we ought, if the
Captain is not out in his reckoning, which I think very
probable, to make this mysterious rook v/ith a man's head,
and begin our shooting.'

' And begin our search for the ruined city and the Fire

THE SQUALL 49

of Life,' corrected Leo, taking his pipe from his mouth,
and laughing a httle.

' Nonsense ! ' I answered. ' You were airing your Arahic
with that man at the tiller this afternoon. What did he
tell you? He has been trading (slave -trading probably) up
and down these latitudes for half of his iniquitous hfe,
and once landed on this very " man " rock. Did ho ever
hear anything of the ruined city or the caves ? '

' No," answered Leo. ' He says that the country is all
swamp behind, and full of snakes, especially pythons, and
game, and that no man Uves there. But then there is a
belt of swamp all along the East African coast, so that
does not go for much.'

'Yes,' I said, 'it does — it goes for malaria. You see
what sort of an opinion these gentry have of the country.
Not one of them will go with us. They think that we are
mad, and upon my word I beheve that they are right.
If ever we see old England again I shall be astonished.
However, it does not greatly matter to me at my age, but
I am anxious for you, Leo, and for Job. It's a Tom Fool's
business, my boy.'

' All right. Uncle Horace. So far as I am concerned,
I am willing to take my chance. Look ! What is that
cloud ? ' and he pointed to a dark blotch upon the starry
sky, some miles astern of us.

' Go and ask the man at the tiller,' I said.

He rose, stretched his arms, and went. Presently he
returned.

' He says it is a squaU, but it will pass far on one side
of us.'

Just then Job came up, looldng very stout and English
in his shooting-suit of brown flannel, and with a sort of
perplexed appearance upon his honest round face that had
been very common with him since he got into these strange
waters.

' Please, sir,' he said, touching his sun hat, which was
stuck on to the back of his head in a somewhat ludicrous
fashion, ' as we have got all those guns and things in the

so

SHE

•whale-boat astern, to say nothing of the provisions in the
lookers, I think it would be best if I got down and slept in
her. I don't hke the looks ' ' (here he dropped his voice to
a portentous whisper) ' of these black gentry ; they have
such a wonderful thievish way about them. Supposing now
that some of them were to slip into the boat at night and
cut the cable, and make off with her ? That would be a
pretty go, that would.'

The whale-boat, I may explain, was one specially built
for us at Dmidee, in Scotland. We had brought it with us,
as we knew that this coast was a network of creeks, and
that we might require something to navigate them with.
She was a beautiful boat, thirty feet in length, with a centre-
board for sailing, copper-bottomed to keep the worm out of
her, and full of water-tight compartments. The captain
of the dhow had told us that when we reached the rock,
which he knew, and which appeared to be identical with
the one described upon the sherd and by Leo's father, he
would probably not be able to run up to it on aoeoimt of the
shallows and breakers. Therefore we had employed three
hours that very morning, whilst we were totally beeahned,
the wind having dropped at sunrise, in transferring most
of our goods and chattels to the whale-boat, and placing the
guns, ammunition, and preserved provisions in the water-
tight lockers specially prepared for them, so that when we
did sight the fabled rock we should have nothing to do but
step into the boat, and run her ashore. Another reason
that induced us to take this precautionary step was that
Arab captains are apt to run past the point that they are
making, either from carelessness or owing to a mistake
in its identity. Now, as sailors know, it is quite impos-
sible for a dhow which is only rigged to run before the
monsoon to beat back against it. Therefore we got our
boat ready to row for the rock at any moment.

'Well, Job,' I said, 'perhaps it would be as well.
There are lots of blankets there, only be careful to keep
oat of the moon, or it may turn your head or bhnd you.'

' Lord, sir ! I don't thmk it would much matter if it

THE SQUALL 51

did ; it it that turned already with the sight of these
blaclcamoors and their filthy, thieving ways. They- are
only fit for muck, they are; and they smell bad enough
for it already.'

Job, it wiU be perceived, was no admirer of the manners
and customs of our dark-skimied brothers.

Accordingly we hauled up the boat by the tow-rope till it
was right under the stem of the dhow, and Job bundled into
her with all the grace of a falling sack of potatoes. Then
we returned and sat down on the deck again, and smoked
and talked in Httle gusts and jerks. The night was so
lovely, and our brains were so full of suppressed excite-
ment of one sort and another, that we did not feel incUned
to turn in. For nearly an hour we sat thus, and then, I
think, we both dozed off. At least I have a faint recol-
lection of Leo sleepily explaming that the head was not a
bad place to hit a buffalo, if you could catch him exactly
between the horns, or send your bullet down his throat,
or some nonsense of the sort.

Then I remember no more ; till suddenly — a frightful
roar of wind, a shriek of terror from the awakening crew,
and a whip-like sting of water in our faces. Some of the
men ran to let go the haulyards and lower the sail, but
the parrel jammed and the yard would not come down.
I sprang to my feet and hung on to a rope. The sky
aft was dark as pitch, but the moon still shone brightly
ahead of us and ht up the blackness. Beneath its sheen
a huge white-topped breaker, twenty feet high or more,
was rushing on to us. It was on the break — the moon
shone on its crest and tipped its foam with light. On
it rushed beneath the inky sky, driven by the awful squall
behind it. Suddenly, in the twinkling of an eye, I saw
the black shape of the whale-boat cast high into the air on
the crest of the breaking wave. Then — a shock of water,
a wild rush of boUing foam, and I was clinging for my
life to the shroud, ay, swept straight out from it Hke a flag
in a gale.

We were pooped.

B 2

S2

SHE

Tlie wave passed. It seemed to me that I was under
water for minutes — really it was seconds. I looked for-
v.'ard. The blkst had torn out the great sail, and high in
the air it was fluttering away to leeward like a huge
wounded bird. Then for a moment there was comparative
calm, and in it I heard Job's voice yelling wildly, ' Come
here to the boat.'

Bewildered and haK drowned as I was, I had the sense
to rush aft. I. felt the dhow sinking under me — she was
full of water. Under her counter the whale-boat was
tossing furiously, and I saw the Arab Mahomed, who had
been steering, leap into her. I gave one desperate pull at
the tow-rope to bring the boat alongside. Wildly I sprang
also, and Job caught me by one arm and I rolled into
the bottom of the boat. Down went the dhow bodily, and
as she did so Mahomed drew his curved knife and severed
the fibre-rope by which we were fast to her, and in another
second we were driving before the storm over the place
where the dhow had been.

' Great God ! ' I shrieked, ' where is Leo ? ieo / Leo I '

' He's gone, sir, God help him ! ' roared Job into my
ear ; and such was the .fury of the squall that his voice
sounded like a whisper.

I wrung my hands in agony. Leo was drowned, and I
was left alive to mourn him.

' Look out ; ' yeUed Job, ' here comes another.'

I turned ; a second huge wave was overtaking us. I half
hoped that it would drown me. With a curious fascination
I watched its awful advent. The moon was nearly hidden
now by the wreaths of the rushing storm, but a little
light still caught the crest of the devouring breaker. There
was something dark on it — a piece of wreckage. It was
on us now, and the boat was nearly full of water. But she
was built in air-tight compartments — Heaven bless the
man who invented them !— and lifted up through it like a
swan. Through the foam and turmoil I saw the black
thing on the wave hurrying right at me. I put out my
right arm to ward it from me, and my hand closed on

THE SQUALL J3

another arm, the wrist of which my fingers gripped like
a vice, I am a very strong man, and had something to
hold to, but my arm was nearly torn from its socket by
the strain and weight of the floating body. Had the rush
lasted another two seconds I must either have let go or
gone vnth it. But it passed, leaving us up to our kneea
in water.

' Bail out ! bail out ! ' shouted Job, suiting the action
to the word.

But I could not bail just then, for as the moon went
out and left us in total darkness, one faint, flying ray of
light lit upon the face of the man I had gripped, who
was now haK lying, half floating in the bottom of the
boat.

It was Leo. Leo brought back by the wave — back,
dead or alive, from the very jaws of Death.

' Bail out ! bail out ! ' yelled Job, ' or we shall founder.'

I seized a large tin bowl with a handle to it, which
was fixed under one of the seats, and the three of us
baUed away for dear life. The furious tempest drove over
and round us, fiinging the boat this way and that, the
wind and the storm wreaths and the sheets of stinging
spray bHnded and bewildered us, but through it all we
worked like demons with the wild exhilaration of des-
pair, for even despair can exhilarate. One minute ! three
minutes ! six minutes 1 The boat began to lighten, and
no fresh wave swamped us. Five minutes more, and she
was fairly clear. Then, suddenly, above the awful shriek-
ings of the hurricane came a duller, deeper roar. Great
Heavens ! It was the voice of breakers !

At that moment the moon began to shine forth again —
this time behind the path of the squall. Out far across
the torn bosom of the ocean shot the ragged arrows of her
light, and there, half a mile aliead of us, was a white line
of foam, then a little space of open-mouthed blackness,
and then another line of white. It was the breakers, and
their roar grew clearer and yet more clear as we sped
down upon them like ^ swallow. There tbey were, boiU

54 SHE

ing up in snowy spouts of spray, smiting and gnashing
together like the gleaming teeth of hell.

' Take the tiller, Mahomed 1 ' I roared in Arabic. ' We
must try and shoot them.' At the same moment I seized
an oar, and got it out, motioning to Job to do likewise.

Mahomed clambered aft, and got hold of the tiller,
and with some difficulty Job, who had sometimes pulled a
tub upon the homely Cam, got out his oar. In another
minute the boat's head was straight on to the ever-nearing
foam, towards which she plunged and tore with the speed
of a racehorse. Just in front of us the first line of breakers
seemed a little thinner than to the right or left — there was
a gap of rather deeper water. I turned and pointed to it.

' Steer for your life, Mahomed ! ' I yeUed. He was a
skilful steersman, and well acquainted with the dangers
of this most perilous coast, and I saw him grip the tiller
and bend his heavy frame forward, and stare at the foam-
ing terror tiU his big round eyes looked as though they
would start out of his head. The send of the sea was
driving the boat's head round to starboard. If we struck
the line of breakers fifty yards to starboard of the gap we
must sink. It was a great field of twisting, spouting
waves. Mahomed planted his foot against the seat before
him, and, glancing at him, I saw his brown toes spread
out like a hand with the weight he put upon them as he
took the strain of the tiller. She came round a bit, but
not enough. I roared to Job to back water, whilst I
dragged and laboured at my oar. She answered now, and
none too soon.

Heavens, we were in them ! And then followed a couple
of minutes of heart-breaking excitement such as I cannot
hope to describe. AU I remember is a shrieking sea of foam,
out of which the billows rose here, there, and everywhere
like avenging ghosts from their ocean grave. Once we
were turned right round, but either by chance, or through
Mahomed's skilful steering, the boat's head came straight
again before a breaker filled us. One more — a monster.
"\Vo were through it or over it — more through than over —

THE SQUALL 55

and then, with a wild yell of exultation from the Arab, we
shot out into the comparative smooth water of the mouth
of sea between the teeth-hke lines of gnashing waves.

But we were half full of water again, and not more than
half a mile ahead was the second line of breakers. Again
we set to and bailed furiously. Fortunately the storm had
now quite gone by, and the moon shone brightly, revealing
a rocky headland running half a mile or more out into the
sea, of which this second line of breakers appeared to be
a continuation. At any rate, they boiled around its foot.
Probably th6 ridge that formed the headland ran out into
the ocean, only at a lower level, and made the reef also.
This headland was terminated by a curious peak that seemed
not to be more than a mile away from us. Just as we got the
boat pretty clear for the second time, Leo, to my immense
relief, opened his eyes and remarked that the clothes had
tumbled off the bed, and that he supposed it was time to
get up for chapel. I told him to shut his eyes and keep
quiet, which he did without in the slightest degree reaHsing
the position. As for myself, his reference to chapel made
me reflect, with a sort of sick longing, on my comfortable
rooms at Cambridge. Why had I been such a fool as to
leave them? This is a reflection that has several tiines
recurred to me since, and with ever-increasing force.

, But now again we are drifting down on the breakers,
though with lessened speed, for the wind had fallen, and
only the current or the tide (it afterwards turned out to be
the tide) was driving us.

Another minute, and with a sort of howl to Allah from
the Arab, a pious ejaculation from myself, and something
that was not pious from Job, we were in them. And then
the whole scene, down to our final escape, repeated itself,
only not quite so violently. Mahomed's skilful steering
and the air-tight compartments saved our lives. In five
minutes we were through, and drifting — for we were too
exhausted to do anything to help ourselves except keep her
head straight — ^with the most startling rapidity round the
headland which I have described.

56 SHE

Bound we went with the tide, until we got well under
the lee of the point, aud then suddenly the speed slackened,
we ceased to make way, and finally appeared to be ia dead
water. The storm had entirely passed, leaviug a clean-
washed sky behind it ; the headland intercepted the heavy
sea that had been occasioned by the squall, and the tide,
which had been running so fiercely up the river (for we
were now in the mouth of a river), was sluggish before it
turned, so we floated quietly, and before the moon went
down managed to bail out the boat thoroughly and get her
a Uttle ship-shape. Leo was sleeping profoundly, and on
the whole I thought it wise not to wake him. It was true
he was sleeping in wet clothes, but the night was now so
warm that I thought (and so did Job) that they were not
likely to injure a man of his unusually vigorous constitu-
tion. Besides, we had no dry ones at hand.

Presently the moon went down, and left us floating on
the waters, now only heaving like some troubled woman's
breast, giving us leisure to reflect upon aU that we had
gone through and all that we had escaped. Job stationed
himself at the bow, Mahomed kept his post at the tiUer,
and I sat on a seat in the middle of the boat close to where
Leo was lymg.

The moon went slowly down in chastened loveliness,
she departed like some sweet bride into her chamber, and
long veil-like shadows crept up the sky through which the
stars peeped shyly out. Soon, however, they too began
to pale before a splendour in the east, and then the quiver-
ing footsteps of the dawn came rushing across the new-
born blue, and shook the planets from their places. Quieter
and yet more quiet grew the sea, quiet as the soft mist
that brooded on her bosom, and covered up her troubling,
as the illusive wreaths of sleep brood upon a pain-racked
mind, causing it to forget its sorrow. From the east to the
west sped the angels of the Da^vn, from sea to sea, from
mountain top to mountain top, scattering light with both
their hands. On they sped out of the darkness, perfect,
glorious, like spirits of the just breaking from the tomb ;

THE SQUALL n

on, over the quiet sea, over the low coast line, and the
swamps beyond, and the mountains beyond them; over
those who slept in peace, and those who woke in sorrow ;
over the evil and the good ; over the hving and dead ;
over the wide world imd all that breathes or has breathed
thereon.

It was a wondorfiJly beautiful sight, and yet sad, per-
haps from the verj excess of its beauty. The arising sun ;
the setting sun ! There we have the symbol and the type
of humanity, and all things with which humanity has to
do. The symbol and the type, yes, and the earthly be-
ginning, and the end also. And on that morning this came
heme to me wjtli a peculiar force. The sun that rose
to-day for us had set last night for eighteen of our fellow-
voyagers ! — had set for ever for eighteen whom we knew !

The dhow had gone down with them, they were tossing
about now among the rocks and seaweed, so much human
drift on the great ocean of death ! And we four were saved.
But one day a sunrise will come when we shall be among
those who are lost, and then others wiU watch those
glorious rays, and grow sad in the midst of beauty, and
dream of Death in the full glow of arising Life 1

For this is the lot of man.

58 SHE

V.

THE HEAD OP THE ETHIOriAN.

At length the heralds and foreminners of the royal sun
had done their work, and, searching out the shadows, had
caused them to flee away. Then up he came in glory from
his ocean-bed, and flooded the earth with warmth and light.
I sat there in the boat Kstening to the gentle lapping of
the water and watched him rise, till presently the slight
drift of the boat brought the odd-shaped rock, or peak, at
the end of the promontory which we had weathered with
so much peril, between me and the majestic sight, and
blotted it from my view. I stUl continued to stare at the
rock, however, absently enough, till presently it became
edged with the fire of the growing light behind it, and then
I started, as well I might, for I perceived that the top of the
peak, which was about eighty feet high by one^hundxed-aniL.
fifty thick at its base, was sEapedriiie~arnegro's head and
face, whereon was stamped a most fiendish and terrifying
expression. There was no doubt about it ; there were the
thick lips, the fat cheeks, and the squat nose standing out
with startHng clearness against the flaming background.
There, too, was the round skuU, washed into shape perhaps
by thousands of years of wind and weather, and, to complete
the resemblance, there was a scrubby growth of weeds or
lichen upon it, which against the sun looked for aU the
world like the wool on a colossal negro's head. It certainly
was very odd ; so odd that now I believe that it is not a
mere freak of nature but a gigantic monument fashioned,
like the well-known Egyptian Sphinx, by a forgotten people
out of a pile of rock that lent itself to tlieir design, perhaps

THE HEAD OF THE ETHIOPIAN 59

as an emblem of warning and defiance to any enemies
who approached the harbour. Unfortunately we were never
able to ascertain whether or not this was the case, inas-
much as the rock was difScult of access both from the land
and the water-side, and we had other things to attend to.
Myself, considering the matter by the light of what we
afterwards saw, I believe that it was fashioned by man, but
whether or not this is so, there it stands, and sullenly stares
from age to age out across the changing sea — there it stood
two thousand years and more ago, when Amenartas, the
Egyptian Princess, and the wife of Leo's remote ancestor
Kallikrates, gazed upon its devilish face — and there I have
no doubt it will stiU stand when as many centuries as are
numbered between her day and our own are added to the
year that bore us to obHvion.

' What do you think of that. Job ? ' I asked of our re-
tainer, who was sitting on the edge of the boat, trying to
get as much sunshine as possible, and generally looking
uncommonly wretched, and I pointed to the fiery and de-
moniacal head.

' Oh Lord, sir,' answered Job, who now perceived the
object for the first time, ' I think that the old geneleman
must have been sitting for his portrait on them rocks.'

I laughed, and the laugh woke up Leo.

' Hullo,' he said, ' what's the matter with me ? I am all
stiff — where is the dhow ? Give me some brandy, please.'

' You may be tlianlsful that you are not stiffer, my boy,'
I answered. ' The dhow is sunk, and everybody on board
Jier is drowned, with the exception of us four, and your
own life was only saved by a miracle ; ' and whilst Job,
now that it was light enough, searched about in a locker
for the brandy for which Leo asked, I told him the history
of our night's adventure.

' Great Heavens ! ' he said, faintly ; ' and to think that
we should have been chosen to live through it I '

By this time the brandy was forthcoming, and we all
had a good pull at it, and thankful enough we were for it.
Also the sun was beginning to get strength, and warm our

6o SHE

chilled bones, for we had been wet through for five hours
or more.

' Why,' said Leo, with a gasp as he put down the
brandy bottle, ' there is the head the writing talks of, the
" rock carven like the head of an Ethiopian." '

' Yes,' I said, ' there it is.'

' WeU, then,' he answered, 'the whole thing is, true.'

' I don't at all see that that follows,' I answered. ' We
knew this head was here, your father saw it. Very likely
it is not the same head that the writing talks of ; or if it
is, it proves nothing.'

Leo smiled at me in a superior way. ' You are an
unbelieving Jew, Uncle Horace,' he said. 'Those who
live will see.'

' Exactly so,' I answered, ' and now perhaps you will
observe that we are drifting across a sandbank into the
mouth of the river. Get hold of your oar, Job, and we will
row in and see if we can find a place to land.'

The river mouth which we were entering did not
appear to be a very wide one, though as yet the long banks
of steaming mist that clung about its shores had not lifted
sufficiently to enable us to see its exact width. There was,
as is the case with nearly every Bast African river, a con-
siderable bar at the mouth, which, no doubt, when the
wind was on shore and the tide running out, was absolutely
impassable even for a boat drawing only a few inches.
But as things were it was manageable enough, and we did
not ship a cupful of water. In twenty minutes we were
well across it, with but slight assistance from ourselves,
and being carried by a strong though somewhat variable
breeze, well up the harbour. By this time the mist was
being sucked up by the sun, which was getting uncomfort-
ably hot, and we saw that the mouth of the little estuary
was here about haK a mile across, and that the banks were
very marshy, and crowded with crocodiles lying about on
the mud like logs. About a mile ahead of us, however, was
what appeared to be a strip of firm land, and for this we
steered. In another quarter of an hour we were there, and

THE HEAD OF THE ETHIOPIAN 6i

maldng the boat fast to a beautiful tree with broad shining
leaves, and flowers of the magnoHa species, only they were
rose-coloured and not white, ' which hung over the water,
we disembarked. This done we undressed, washed our-
selves, and spread our clothes and the contents of the boat
in the sun to dry, which they very quickly did. Then,
taking shelter fcom the sun under some trees, we made a
hearty breakfast off a ' Paysandu ' potted tongue, of which
we had brought a good quantity with us from the Army
and Navy Stores, congratulating ourselves loudly on our
good fortune in having loaded and provisioned the boat
on the pre^dous day before the hurricane destroyed the
dhow. By the time that we had finished our meal our
clothes were quite dry, and we hastened to get into them,
feehng not a little refreshed. Indeed, with the esception of
weariness and a few bruises, none of us were the worse for
the terrifying adventure which had been fatal to all our
companions. Leo, it is true, had been half-drowned, but
that is no great matter to a vigorous young athlete of
five-and-twenty.

After breakfast we started to look about us. We were
on a strip of dry land about two hundred yards broad
by five hundred long, bordered on one side by the river,
and on the other three by endless desolate swamps, that
stretched as far as the eye could reach. This strip of
land was raised about twenty-five feet above the plain of
the surrounding swamps and the river level: indeed it
had every appearance of having been made by the hand
of man.

' This place has been a wharf,' said Leo, dogmatic-
ally.

' Nonsense,' I answered. ' Who would be stupid enough
to build a wharf in the middle of these dreadful marshes
in a country inhabited by savages, that is if it is inhabited
ataU?'

' There is a Imo-wn species of magnolia with pink flowers. It is
indigenous in Silikim, and known as Magnolia Campbellii. —
Editor.

62 SHE

' Perhaps it was not always marsh, and pcriiaps the
people were not always savage,' he said drily, looking dovrn
the steep bank, for we were standing by the river. ' Look
there,' he went on, pointing to a spot where the hurricane
of the previous night had torn up one of the mangolia trees,
which had grown on the extreme edge of the bank just
where it sloped down to the water, by the roots, and lifted
a large cake of earth with them. ' Is not that stonework ?
If not, it is very like it.'

' Nonsense,' I said again, and we clambered down to
the spot, and got between the upturned roots and the
bank.

' WeU ? ' he said.

But I did not answer this time. I only whistled. For
there, laid bare by the removal of the earth, was an undoubted
faouig of solid stone laid in large blocks and bound together
with brown cement, so hard that I could make no impression
on it with the file in my shooting knife. Nor was this all ;
seeing something projecting through the soil at the bottom
of the bared patch of walling, I removed the loose earth
Vi'ith my hands, and revealed a huge stone ring, a foot or
more in diameter, and about three inches thick. This
fairly staggered me.

'Looks rather like a wharf where good-sized vessels
have been moored, does it not. Uncle Horace ? ' said Leo,
with an excited grin.

I tried to say ' Nonsense ' again, but the word stuck
in my throat — the ring spoke for itself. Li some past age
vessels had been moored there, and this stone wall was
undoubtedly the remnant of a solidly constructed wharf.
Probably the city to which it had belonged lay buried
beneath the swamp behind it.

' Begins to look as though there Were something in the
story after all. Uncle Horace,' said the exultant Leo ; and
reflecting on the mysterious negro's head and the equally
mysterious stonework, I made no direct reply.

' A country like Africa,' I said, ' is sure to be full of
the relics of long dead and forgotten civilisations. Nobody

THE HEAD OF THE ETHIOPIAN 63

knows the age of tlie Egyptian civilisation, and very likely
it had offshoots. Then there were the Babylonians and the
Phoenicians, and the Persians and all manner of people,
all more or less oiviUsed, to say nothing of the Jews whom
everybody " wants " nowadays. It is possible that they, or
any one of them, may have had colonies or trading stations
about here. Eemember those buried Persian cities that
the consul showed us at Kilwa.' '

' Quite so,' said Leo, ' but that is not what you said
before.'

' Well, what is to be done now ? ' I asked, turning the
conversation.

As no answer was forthcoming we proceeded to the
edge of the swamp, and looked over it. It was apparently
boundless, and vast flocks of every sort of waterfowl came
flying from its recesses, till it was sometimes difficult to
see the sky. Now that the sun was getting high it drew
thin sickly looking clouds of poisonous vapour from the
surface of the marsh and from the scummy pools of stagnant
water,

' Two things are clear to me,' I said, addressing my
three companions, who stared at this spectacle in dismay :
' first, that we can't go across there ' (I pointed to the
swamp), ' and, secondly, that if we stop here we shall
certainly die of fever.'

' That's as clear as a haystack, sir,' said Job.

' Very weU, then ; there are two alternatives before us.
One is to 'bout ship, and try and run for some port in the
whale-boat, which would be a sufficiently risky proceeduig,

' Near Kilwa, on the East Coast of Africa, about 400 miles south
of Zanzibar, is a cliff which has been recently washed by the waves.
On the top of this cliff are Persian tombs known to be at least seven
centuries old by the dates still legible upon them. Beneath these
tombs is a layer of dihris representing a city. Farther down the
cliff is a second layer representing an older city, and further down
still a third layer, the remains of yet another city of vast and un-
known antiquity. Beneath the bottom city were recently found some
specimens of glazed earthenware, such as are occasionally to be met
with on that coast to this day. I believe that they are now in the
possession of Sir John Kirk. — Editor.

64 . SHE

and the otlier to sail or row on up the river, and see where
we come to.'

'I don't know what you are going to do,' said teo,:
setting his mouith,' but I am going up that river.'

Job turned up the whites of his eyes and groaned, and
the Arab murmured ' Allah,' and groaned also. As forme, I,
remarked sweetly that as we seemed to be between the devil
and the deep sea, it did not much matter where we went. But
in reality I was as anxious to proceed as Leo. The colossal
negro's head and the stone wharf had excited my curiosity,
to an extent of which I was secretly ashamed, and I was
prepared to gratify it at any cost. Accordingly, having
carefully fitted the mast, restowed the boat, and got out our
rifles, we embarked. Fortunately the wind was blowings
on shore from the ocean, so we were able to hoist the sail.
Indeed, we afterwards found out that as a general rule the
wind set on shore from daybreak for some hours, and off
shore again at sunset, and the explanation that I offer of
this is, that when the earth is cooled by the dew and the
night the hot air rises, and the draught rushes in from the
sea till the sun has once more heated it through. At least
that appeared to be the rule here.

Taking advantage of this favouring wind, we sailed
merrily up the river for three or four hours. Once we came
across a school of hippopotami, which rose, and bellowed
dreadfully at us within ten or a dozen fathoms of the boat,,
much to Job's alarm, and, I will confess, to my own.
These were the first hippopotami that we had ever seen,
and, to judge by their insatiable curiosity, I should judge
that we were the first white men that they had ever seen.
Upon my word, I once or twice thought that they were
coming into the boat to gratify it. Leo wanted to fire at
them, but I dissuaded him, fearing the consequences. Also
we saw hundreds of crocodiles basking on the muddy banks,
and thousands upon thousands of waterfowl. Some of
these we shot, and among them was a wild goose, which,
in addition to the sharp curved spurs on its wings, had a
spur about three-quarters of an inch long growuig from the

THE HEAD OF THE ETHIOPIAN 65

skull just between tlie eyes. We never sliot another like
it, so I do not know if it was a ' sport ' or a distinct species.
In the latter case this incident may interest naturaUsts.
Job named it the Unicorn Goose.

About midday the sun grew intensely hot, and the
stench drawn up by it from the marshes which the river
drains was something too awful, and caused us instantly
to swallow precautionary doses of qumine. Shortly after-
wards the breeze died away altogether, and as rowing our
heavy boat against stream in the heat was out of the ques-
tion, we were thankful enough to get under the shade of a
group of trees — a species of willow — that grew by the edge
of the river, and lie there and gasp till at length the
approach of sunset put a period to our miseries. Seeing
what appeared to be an open space of water straight ahead
of us, we determined to row there before settling what to
do for the night. Just as we were about to loosen the boat,
however, a beautiful water-buck, with great horns curvuig
- forward, and a white stripe across the rump, came down
to the river to drink, without perceiving us hidden away
within fifty yards under the willows. Leo was the first to
catch sight of it, and being an ardent sportsman, thirsting
for the blood of big game, about which he had been dream-
ing for months, he instantly stiffened all over, and pointed
like a setter dog. Seeing what was the matter, I handed
him his express rifle, at the same time taking my own.

' Now then,' I whispered, ' mind you don't miss.'

' Miss ! ' he whispered back contemptuously ; ' I could
not miss it if I tried.'

He lifted the rifle, and the roan-colom-ed buck, havuig
drunk his fill, raised his head and looked out across the
river. He was standing right against the sunset sky on a
little eminence, or ridge of ground, which ran across tho
swamp, evidently a favourite path for game, and there was
something very beautiful about him. Indeed, I do not
think that if I live to a hundred I shall ever forget thnt
desolate and yet most fascinating scene : it is staSaped
upon my memory. To the right and left were wide stretches

66 • SttM

of lonely, death-breeding swaing, unbroken and unrelieved
so far as the eye could reach, except here and there by ponds
of black and peaty water that, mirror -like, flashed up the
red rays of the setting sun. Behind us and before stretched
the vista of the sluggish river, ending in glimpses of a reed-
fringed lagoon, on the surface of which the long lights of the
evening played as the faint breeze stirred the shadows. To
the west loomed the huge red ball of the sinking sun, now
vanishing down the vapoury horizon, and filling the great
heaven, high across whose arch the cranes and wild fowl
streamed in line, square, and triangle, with flashes of flying
gold and the lurid stain of blood. And then ourselves — three
modern Englishmen in a modern English boat — seeming
to jar upon and looking out of tone with that measureless
desolation ; and in front of us the noble buck limned out
upon a background of ruddy sky.

Bang ! Away he goes with a mighty bound. Leo has
missed him. Bang I right under him again. Now for a
shot'. I must, have one, though he is going like an arrow,
and a hundred yards away and more. By Jove ! over and
over and over ! ' Well, I think I've wiped your eye there,
Master Leo,' I say, struggling against the ungenerous
exultation that in such a supreme moment of one's exist-
ence will rise in the best-inannered sportsman's breast.

' Confound you, yes,' growled Leo ;_.and then, with that
quick sinile that is one of his charms hghting up his hand-
some face like a ray of light, ' I beg your pardon, old
fellow. I congratulate you ; it was a lovely shot, and mine
were vile.'

We got out of the boat and ran to the buck, which was
shot through the spine and stone dead. It took us a
quarter of an hour or njore to clean it and cut off as much
of the best meat as we could carry, and, having packed this
away, we had barely light enough to row up into the lagoon-
like space, into which, there being a hollow in the swamp,
the river here expanded. Just as the light vanished we
cast anchor about thirty fathoms from the edge of the lake.
We did not dare to go ashore, not knowing if we should

THE HEAD OF THE ETHIOPIAN 67

find dry ground to camp on, and greatly fearing tlie
poisonous exhalations from the marsh, from which we
thought we should be freer on the water. So we lighted
a lantern, and made our evening meal ,off another potted'
tongue in the best fashion that we could, and then prepared
to go to sleep, only, however, to find that sleep was im-
possible. For, whether they wore attracted by the lantern,
or by the unaccustomed smell of a white man, for which
they had been waiting for the last thousand years or so, I
Imow not ; but certainly we were presently attacked by tens
of thousands of the most bloodthirsty, pertinacious, and
huge mosquitoes that I ever saw or read of. In clouds they
came, and pinged and buzzed and bit till we were nearly
mad. Tobacco smoke only seemed to stir them into a
merrier and more active life, till at length we were driven
to covering ourselves with blankets, head and all, and
sitting to slowly stew and_continually scratch and swear
beneath them. And as we sat, suddenly rolling out like
thunder through the silence came the deep roar of a lion,
and then of a second lion, moving among the reeds within
sixty yards of us.

' I say,' said Leo, sticking his head out from under his
blanket, 'lucky we ain't on the bank, eh, Avimcular?'
(Leo sometimes addressed me in this disrespectful way.) ,
' Curse it ! a mosquito has bitten me on the nose,' and the
head vanished again.

Shortly after this the moon came up, and notwith-
standing every variety of roar that echoed over the water
to us from the lions on the banks, we began, thinking our-
selves perfectly secure, to gradually doze off.

I do not quite know what it was that made me poke my
head out of the friendly shelter of the blanket, perhaps
because I found that the mosquitoes were biting right
through it. Anyhow, as I did so I heard Job whisper,
in a frightened voice —

' Oh, my stars, look there ! '

Instantly we all of us looked, and this was what we saw
in the moonlight. Near the shore were two wide and

E a

68 SHE ■

ever-widening circles of concentric rings rippling away
across the surface of the water, and in the heart and centre
of the circles were two dark moving objects.

'What is it? 'asked I.

' It is those damned lions, sir,' answered Job, in a tone
which was an odd mixture of a sense of personal injury,
habitual respect, and acknowledged fear, ' and they are
swimming here to ?ieat us,' he added, nervously picking up
an ' h ' in his agitation.

I looked again, there was no doubt about it ; I could
catch the glare of their ferocious eyes. Attracted either
by the smell of the newly killed waterbuok meat or of
ourselves, the hungry beasts were actually storming our
position.

Leo already had his rifle in his hand. I called to him
to wait tiU they were nearer, and meanwhile grabbed my
own. Some fifteen feet from us the water shallowed on a
bank to the depth of about fifteen inches, and presently
the first of them — it was the lioness — got on to it and shook
herself and roared. At that moment Leo fired, and the
bullet went right down her open mouth and out at the
back of her neck, and down she dropped, with a splash,
dead. The other lion — a full-grown male — was some two
paces behind her. At this second he got his forepaws on
to the bank, when a strange thing happened. There was
a rush and disturbance of the water, such as one sees in a
pond in England when a pike takes a little fish, only a
thousand times fiercer and larger, and suddenly the lion
gave a most terrific snarling roar and sprang forward on to
the bank, dragging something black with him.

' Allah ! ' shouted Mahomed, ' a crocodile has got him
by the leg ! ' and sure enough he had. We could see the
long snout with its gleaming lines of teeth and the reptile
body behind it.

And then followed an extraordinary scene indeed.
The Hon managed to get well on to the bank, the crocodile
half standing and half swimming, still nipping his hind
leg. He roared till the air quivered with the sound, and

THE HEAD OF THE ETHIOPIAN 69

then, •with a savage, shrieking snarl, turned round and
clawed hold of the crocodile's head. The crocodile
shifted his grip, having, as we afterwards discovered,
had one of his eyes torn out, and slightly turned over,
and instantly the lion got him by the throat and held
on, and then over and over they roUed upon the bank
struggling hideously. It was impossible to follow their
movements, but when next we got a clear view the
tables had turned, for the crocodile, whose head seemed
to be a mass of gore, had got the Uon's body in his iron
jaws just above the hips, and was squeezing him and
shaking him to and fro. For his part the tortured
brute, roaring in agony, was clawing and biting madly at
his enemy's scaly head, and fixing his great hind claws
in the crocodile's, comparatively speaking, soft throat,
ripping it open as one would rip a glove.

Then, all of a sudden, the end came. The lion's head
fell forward on the crocodile's back, and with an awful
groan he died, and the crocodile, after standing for a
minute motionless, slowly rolled over on to his side, his
jaws still fixed across the carcases of the lion, which we
afterwards found he had bitten almost in halves.

This duel to the death was a wonderful and a shocking
sight, and one that I suppose few men have seen — and
thus it ended.

When it was all over, leaving Mahomed to keep a look
out, we managed to spend the rest of the night as quietly
as the mosquitoes would allow.

70 SHE

VI.

AN EAELY OHKISTIAN 0BEB3I0NT.

Next morning, at the earliest blush of dawn, wo rose,
performed such ablutions as circumstances would allow,
and generally made ready to start. I am bound to say that
when there was sufficient light to enable us to see each
other's faces I, for one, burst out into a roar of laughter.
Job's fat and comfortable countenance was swollen out
to nearly twice its natural size from mosquito bites, and
Leo's condition was not much better. Indeed, of the
three I had come off much the best, probably owing to the
toughness of my dark sMn, and to the fact that a good
deal of it was covered by hair, for since we started from
England I had allowed my naturally luxuriant beard to
grow at its own sweet will. But the other two were, com-
paratively spealdng, clean shaved, which of course gave
the enemy a larger extent of open country to operate on,
though as for Mahomed the mosquitoes, recognising the
taste of a true believer, would not touch him at any price.
How often, I wonder, during the next week or so did we
wish that we were flavoured like an Arab !

By the time that we had done laughmg as heartily as
our swollen lips would allow, it was daylight, and the
morning breeze was coming up from the sea, cutting lanes
through the dense marsh mists, and here and there rolling
them before it in great balls of fleecy vapour. So we set
our sail, and having first taken a look at the two dead lions
and the dead alligator, which we were of course unable to
skin, being destitute of means of curing the pelts, we
started, and, sailing through the lagoon, followed the
course of the river on the farther side. At midday, when
the breeze dropped, we were fortunate enough to find a

AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CEREMONY 71

convenient piece of dry land on wHcli to camp and light a
fire, and here we cooked two wild duck and some of the
waterbuck's flesh — not in a very appetising way, it is true,
but still, sufficiently. The rest of the buck's flesh we cut
into strips and hung in the sun to dry into ' biltong,' as I
believe the South African Dutch call flesh thus prepared.
On this welcome patch of dry land we stopped till the
following dawn, and, as before, spent the night in warfare
with the mosquitoes, but without other troubles. The
next day or two passed in similar fashion, and without
noticeable adventures, except that we shot a specimen of a
peculiarly graceful hornless buck, and saw many varieties
of water-Hlies in full bloom, some of them blue and of
exquisite beauty, though few of the flowers were perfect,
owing to the prevalence of a white water-maggot with a
green head that fed upon them.

It was on the fifth day of our journey, when we had
travelled, so far as we could reckon, about one hundred and
thirty-five to a hmidred and forty miles westwards from the
coast, that the first event of any real importance occurred.
On that morning the usual wind failed us about eleven
o'clock, and after pulling a Httle way we were forced to
halt more or less exhausted at what appeared to be the
junction of our stream with another of a uniform width of
about fifty feet. Some trees grew near at hand — the only
trees in all this country were along the banks of the river,
and under these we rested, and then, the land being fairly
dry just here, walked a little way along the edge of the river
to prospect, and shoot a few waterfowl for -food. Before
we had gone fifty yards we perceived that all hopes of
getting further up the stream in the whale-boat were at an
end, for not two hundred yards above where we had stopped-
were a succession of shallows and mudbanks, with not six
inches of water over them. It was a watery cul-de-sac.

Turning ba"ck, we walked some way along the banks
of the other river, and soon came to the conclusion, from
various indications, that it was not a river at all, but
an ancient canal, like the one which is to be seen above

72 SHE

Mombasa, on the Zanzibar coast, connecting the Tana Eiver
with the Ozy, in such a way as to enable the shipping coming
down the Tana to cross to the Ozy, and reach the sea by
it, and thus avoid the very dangerous bar that blocks the
mouth of the Tana. The canal before us had evidently
been dug out by man at some remote period of the world's
history, and the results of his digging still remained in the
shape of the raised banks that had no doubt once formed
towing-paths. Except here and there, where they had
been hoUowed out or fallen in, these banks of stifif binding
clay were at a uniform distance from each other, and the
depth of the water also appeared to be uniform. Current
there was little or none, and, as a consequence, the surface
of the canal was choked with vegetable growth, intersected
by little paths of clear water, made, I suppose, by the con-
stant passage of waterfowl, iguanas, and other ver-
min. Now, as it was evident that we could not proceed
up the river, it became equally evident that we must
either try the canal or else return to the sea. We could
not stc)prwh"ere"we were, to be baked by the sun and eaten
up by the mosquitoes, till we died of fever in that dreary
marsh.

' Well, I suppose that we must try it,' I said ; and the
others assented in their various ways — Leo, as though it
were the best joke in the world ; Job, in respectful disgust ;
and Mahomed, with an invocation to the Prophet, and a
comprehensive curse upon all unbelievers and their ways
of thought and travel.

Accordingly, as soon as the sun got low, havmg little
or nothing more to hope for from our friendly wind, we
started. For the first hour or so we managed to row the
boat, though with great labour ; but after that the weeds
got too thick to allow of it, and we were obliged to resort
to the primitive and most exhausting resource of towing
her. For two hours we laboured, Mahomed, Job, and I,
who was supposed to be strong enough to pull against
the two of them, on the bank, while Leo sat in the bow of
the boat, and brushed awajf the weeds which collected

AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CEREMONY 73

round the cutwater with Mahomed's sword. At dark we
halted for some hours to rest and enjoy the mosquitoes, but
about midnight we went on again, taking advantage of the
comparative cool of the night. At dawn we rested for three
hours, and then started once more, and laboured on till
about ten o'clock, when a thunderstorm, accompanied by
a deluge of rain, overtook us, and we spent the next six
hours practically under water.

I do not know that there is any necessity for me to
describe the next four days of our voyage in detail, further
than to say that they were, on the whole, the most miser-
able that I ever spent in my life, forming one monotonous
record of heavy labour, heat, misery, and mosquitoes. All
the way we passed through a region of almost endless
swamp, and I can only attribute our escape from fever
and death to the constant doses of quinine and purgatives
which we took, and the unceasing toil which we were
forced to undergo. On the third day of our journey up
the canal we had sighted a round hill that loomed dimly
through the vapours of the marsh, and on the evening of
the fourth night, when we camped, this hiU seemed to be
within five-and-twenty or thirty miles of us. We were by
now utterly exhausted, and felt as though our blistered
hands could not puU the boat a yard farther, and that the
best thing that we could do would be to lie down and die
in that dreadful wilderness of swamp. It was an awful
position, and one in which I trust no other white man will
ever be placed ; and as I threw myself down in the boat
to sleep the sleep of utter exhaustion, I bitterly cursed my
foUy in ever having been a party to such a mad under-
taking, which could, I saw, only end in our death in this
ghastly land. I thought, I remember, as I slowly sank
into a dose, of what the appearance of the boat and her
imhappy crew would be in two or three months' time from
that night. There she would lie, with gaping seams and
half filled with foetid water, which, when the mist-laden
wind stirred her, would wash backwards and forwards
through our mouldering bones, and that would be the end

74 SHE

of her, and of those in her who would follow after myths
and seek out the secrets of nature.

Already I seemed to hear the water rippling against the
dessicated bones and rattling them together, "rolling my
skull against Mahomed's, and his against, mine, tiU at
last Mahomed's stood straight up upon its vertebrae, and
glared at me through its empty eyeholes, and cursed me
with its grinning jaws, because I, a dog of a Christian,
disturbed the last sleep of a true beHever. I opened my
eyes, and shuddered at the horrid dream, and then shud-
dered again at something that was not a dream, for two
great eyes were gleaming down at me through the misty
darkness. I struggled up, and in my terror and confusion
shrieked, and shrieked again, so that the others sprang up
too, reeHng, and drunken with sleep and fear. And then
all of a sudden there was a flash of cold steel, and a great
spear was held against my throat, and behind it other
spears gleamed cruelly.

' Peace,' said a voice, speaking in Arabic, or rather
in some dialect into which Arabic entered very largely;
' who are ye who come hither swimming on the water ?
Speak or ye die,' and the steel pressed sharply against my
throat, sending a cold chUl through me.

' We are travellers, and have come hither by chance,'
I answered in my best Arabic, which appeared to be
understood, for the man turned his head, and, addressing
a tall form that towered up in the background, said,
' Father, shall we slay ? '

' What is the colour of the men ? ' said a deep voice in
answer.

' White is their colour.'

' Slay not,' was the reply. ' Four suns since was the
word brought to me from " She-ivho-mitst-be-obcyed,''
'' White men come ; if white men come, slay them not."
Let them be brought to the land of " Slie-iuho-must-be-
obeyed." Bring forth the men, and let that which they
have with them be brought forth also.'

' Come,' said the man, half leading and half dragging

AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CEREMONY 75

me from the boat, and as he did so I perceived other meu
doing the same kind o£5ce t&my compaiiions.

On the bank were gathered a company of some fifty
men.' tithat hght all I could make out was that they
were a,rmed with huge spears, were very tall, and strongly
built, comparatively light -in colour, and nude, save for a
leopard-sldn tied round the middle.

Presently Leo and" Job were bundled oiit and placed
beside me.

' What on earth is up ? ' - said Leo, rubbing hi* eyes.

' Oh, Lord I sir, here's a rum go,' ejaculated Job ; and
just at that moment a disturbance ensued, and Mahomed
(Same tumbling between us, followed by a shadowy form
with an uplifted spear.

' AUah ! Allah ! ' howled Mahomed, feeling that he
had little to hope from man, ' protect me ! protect me ! '

' Father, it is a black one,' said a voice. ' What said
" She-who-must-be-obeyed " about the black one ? '

' She said naught ; but slay him not. Come hither, my
son.'

The man advanced, and the tail shadowy form bent
forwBj-d and whispered something.

'Yes, yes,' said the other, and chuckled in a rather
blood-curdling tone.

^ Are the ihree white men there ? ' asked the form.

' Yes, they are there.'

' Tlien bring up that which is made ready for them, and
let the men take all that can be brought from the thing
which floats.'

Hardly had he spoken when men came running up,
carrying on their shoulder's neither more nor less than
palanquins — four bearers and two spare men to a palanquin
— ^and in these it was promptly indicated we were expected
to stow ourselves.

' Well ! ' said Leo, ' it is a blessing to find anybody
to cari-y us after having to carry ourselves so long.'

Leo always takes a cheerful view of things.

There being no help for it, after seeing the others into

^(> SHE

theirs I tumbled into my own litter, and very comfortable
I found it. It appeared to be manufactured of cloth woven
from grass-fibre, wbioh stretched and yielded to every
motion after the body, and, being bound top and bottom
to the bearing pole, gave a grateful support to the head
and neck.

Scarcely had I settled myself when, accompanying
their steps with a monotonous song, the bearers started
at a swinging trot. For half an hour or so I lay still,
reflecting on the very remarkable experiences that we were
going through, and wondering if any of my eminently
respectable fossil friends down at Cambridge would beheve
me if I were to be miraculously set at the familiar dinner-
table for the purpose of relating them. I don't want to
convey any disrespectful notion or slight when I call those
good and learned men fossils, but my experience is that
people are apt to fossilise even at a University if they
follow the same paths too persistently. I was getting
fossUised myself, but of late my stock of ideas has been
very much enlarged. Well, I lay and reflected, and
wondered what on earth would be the end of it all, till at
last I ceased to wonder, and went to sleep.

I suppose I must have slept for seven or eight hours,
getting the first real rest that I had had since the night
before the loss of the dhow, for when I woke the smi was
high in the heavens. "We were still journeying on at a
pace of about four mUes an hour. Peeping out through
the mist-like curtains of the litter, which were ingeniously
fixed to the bearing pole, I perceived to my infinite rehef
that we had passed out of the region of eternal swamp,
and were now travielling over sweUing grassy plains to-
wards a cup-shaped hill. Whether or not it was the same
hill that we had seen from the canal I do not know, and
have never since been able to discover, for, as we after-
wards found out, those people will give little information
upon such points. Next I glanced at the men who were
bearing me. They were of a magnificent build, few of
them being under six feet in height, and yellowish in

AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CEREMONY 77

colour. Generally their appearance had a good deal in
common with that of the East African Somali, only their
hair was not frizzed up, and hung in thick black locks
upon their shoulders. Their features were aquiline, and
in many cases exceedingly handsome, the teeth being
especially regular and beautiful. But notwithstanding
their beauty, it struck me that, on the whole, I had never
seen a more evil-looking set of faces. There was an aspect
of cold and sullen cruelty stamped upon them that revolted
me, and which in some cases was almost uncanny in its
intensity.

Another thing which struck me about them was that they
never seemed to smile. Sometimes they sang the monoio-
nous song of which I have spoken, but when they were
not singing they remained almost perfectly silent, and the
light of a laugh never came to brighten their sombre and
evil countenances. Of what race could these people be ?
Their language was a bastard Arabic, and yet they were not
Arabs ; I was quite sure of that. For one thing they were
too dark, or rather yellow. I could not say why, but I
know that their appearance filled me with a sick fear of
which I felt ashamed. While I was still wondering another
litter came up alongside of mine. In it — for the curtains
were drawn — sat an old man, clothed in a whitish robe,
made apparently from coarse linen, that hung loosely about
him, who, I at once jumped to the conclusion, was the
shadowy figure who had stood on the bank and been ad-
dressed as ' Father.' He was a wonderful-looking old man,
Avith a snowy beard, so long that the ends of it hung over
the sides of the litter, and he had a hooked nose, above
which flashed out a pair of eyes as keen as a snake's, while
his whole countenance was instinct with a look of wise and
sardonic humour impossible to describe on paper.

' Art thou awake, stranger ? ' he said in a deep and low
voice.

' Surely, my father,' I answered courteously, feeling
certain that I should do well to conciUate this ancient
Mammon of Unrighteousness.

78 SHE

He stroked his beautiful white beard, and smiled
faintly.

' Prom whatever country thou camest,' lie said, ' and
by the way it must be from one where somewhat of our
language is known, they teach their children courtesy
there, my stranger son. And noAv wherefore- comest thou
unto this land, which scarce an aUen foot has pressed from
the time that man knoweth ? Art thou and those with
thee weary of hfe ? '

'We came to iind new things,' I answered boldly.
' We are tired of the old things ; we have come up out
of the sea to know that which is ujiknown. We are of a
brave race who fear not death, my very much respected
father — that is, if we can get a little fresh information
before we die.'

' Humph ! ' said the old gentleman, ' that may be true ;
it is rash to contradict, otherwise I should say that thou
"wast lying', my son. HcSwever, I darie s^y that " SKe-wJio
must-be-obeyed " will meet thy wishes in the matter.'

'Who is " She-who-inust-be-obeyed'^ " ' I" asked,
curiously. ■

The old man glanced at the bearers, and then answered,
with a little smile that somehow sent my blood to my
heart— . . - .

'Surely, my stranger, son, thou wilt learn soon enough,
if it be her pleasure to see thee at all in the flesh.'

' In the flesh ? ' I answered. ' What may my father
wish to convey ? '

But the old man only laughed a dreadful laugh, and
made no reply. .

' What is the name of my father's people ? ' I asked.

' The name of my people is Amahagger ' (the People
of the Eocks).

' And if a son might ask, what is the name of my
father ? '

' My name is Billali.'

• And whither go we, my father ? '

' That shalt thou see,' and at a sign from him. his

AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CEREMONY 79

bearers started forward at a run till they reached the litter
in which Job was reposing (with one leg hanging over the
side). Apparently, however, he could not make much out
of Job, for presently I saw his bearers trot forward to Leo's
litter. ;

And after that, as nothing fresh occurred, I yielded to
the pleasant swaying motion of the litter, and went to sleep
agam. I was dreadfully tired. When I woke I found that
we were passing through a rooky defile of a lava formation
with precipitous sides, iu which grew many beautiful trees
and flowering shrubs.

Presently this defile took a turn, and a lovely sight
unfolded itself to my eyes. Before us was a vast cup of
green from four to six miles in extent, of the shape of a
Eoman amphitheatre. The sides of this great cup were
rocky, and clothed with bush, but the centre was of the
richest meadow land, studded with single trees of mag-
nificent growth, and watered by meandering brooks. On
this rich plain grazed herds of goats and cattle, but I saw
no sheep. At first I could not imagine what this strange
spot could be, but presently it flashed upon me that it must
represent the crater of some long-extinct volcano, which
had afterwards been a lake, and was ultimately drained in
some unexplained way. And here I may state that from my
subsequent experience of this and a much larger, but other-
wise similar spot, which I shall have occasion to describe by-
and-by, I have every reason to beHeve that this conclusion
was correct. What puzzled me, however, was that, although
there were people moving about herding the goats and
cattle, I saw no signs of any human habitation. Where
did they all live? I wondered. My curiosity was soon
destined to be gratified. Turning to the left the string of
litters followed the cliffy sides of the crater for a distance
of about half a mile, or perhaps a Httle less, and then
halted. Seeing the old gentleman, my adopted 'father,'
Billali, emerge from his litter, I did the same, and so did
Leo and Job. The first thing I saw was our wretched
Arab companion, Mahomed, lying exhausted on the ground.

So ■ SHE

It appeared that lie had not been provided with a litter,
but had been forced to run the entire distance, and, as he
was abeady quite worn out when we started, his condition
now was one of great prostration.

On looking round we discovered that the place where
we had halted was a platform ia front of the mouth of a
great cave, and piled upon this platform were the entire
contents of the whale-boat, even down to the oars and sail.
Bound the cave stood groups of the men who had escorted
us, and other men of a similar stamp. They were all tall
and all handsome, though they varied in their degree of
darkness of skin, some being as dark as Mahomed, and
some as yellow as a Chinese. They were naked, except for
the leopard-skin round the waist, and each of them carried
a huge spear.

There were also some women among them, who, in-
stead of the leopard-skin, wore a tanned hide of a small red
buck, something hke that of the orib^, only rather darker in
colour. These woman were, as a class, exceedingly good-
looking, with large, dark eyes, well-cut features, and a
thick bush of curling hair — not crisped like a negro's —
ranging from black to chestnut in hue, with all shades of
intermediate colour. Some, but very few of them, wore a
yellowish linen garment, such as I have described as worn
by BiUali, but this, as we afterwards discovered, was a
mark of rank, rather than an attempt at clothing. For the
rest, their appearance was not quite so terrifying as that of
the men, and they sometimes, though rarely, smiled. As
soon as we had alighted they gathered round us and
examined us with curiosity, but without excitement. Leo's
tall, athletic form and clear-cut Grecian face, however,
evidently excited their attention, and when he politely
lifted his hat to them, and showed his curhng yellow hair,
there was a slight murmur of admiration. Nor did it stop
there ; for, after regardmg him critically from head to foot,
the handsomest of the young women — one wearing a robe,
and with hair of a shade between brown and chestnut —
deliberately advanced to him, and, in a way that would

AN EARLY CHRISTIAN CEREMONY 8 1

have been winning had it not been so determined, quietly
put her arm round his neck, bent forward, and kissed him
on the lips.

I gave a gasp, expecting to see Leo instantly speared ;
and Job ejaculated, ' The hussy — well, I never I ' As for
Leo, he looked slightly astonished ; and then, remarking
that we had got into a country where they clearly followed
the customs of the early Christians, deliberately returned
the embrace.

Again I gasped, thinking that something would happen ;
but to my surprise, though some of the young women
showed traces of vexation, the older ones and the men only
smiled sHghtly. When we came to understand the cus-
toms of this extraordinary people the mystery was explained.
It then appeared that, in direct opposition to the habits of
almost every other savage race in the world, women among
the Amahagger are not only upon terms of perfect equaUty
with the men, but are not held to them by any binding ties.
Descent is traced only through the Une of the mother, and
while individuals are as proud of a long and superior female
ancestry as we are of our families in Europe, they never
pay attention to, or even acknowledge, any man as their
father, even when their male parentage is perfectly well
known. There is but one titular male parent of each tribe,
or, as they call it, ' Household,' and he is its elected and
immediate ruler, with the title of ' Father.' For instance, the
nian'Billali was the father of this 'household,' which oon-
sibted of about seven thousand individuals aU told, and no
other man was ever called by that name. When a woman
took a fancy to a man she signified her preference by ad-
vancing and embracing him publicly, in the same way that
this handsome and exceedingly prompt young lady, who
was called Ustane, had embraced Leo. If he kissed her back
it was a token that he accepted her, and the arrangement
continued till one of them wearied of it. I am bound,
however, to say that the change of husbands was not nearly
60 frequent as might have been expected. Nor did quarrels
arise out of it, at least among the men, who, when their

G

Si • SHE

wives deserted them in favour of a rival, accepted the whole
thing much as we accept the income-tax or our marriage
laws, as something not to he disputed, and as tending to
the good of the community, however disagreeable they may
in particular instances prove to the individual.

It is very curious to observe how the customs of man-
kind on this matter vary in different countries, making
morality an affair of latitude, and what is right and proper
in one place wrong and improper in another. It must,
however, be understood that, as all civilised nations appear
to accept it as an axiom that ceremony is the touchstone of
morality, there is, even according to our canons, nothing
immoral about this Amahagger custom, seeing that the
interchange of the embrace answers to our ceremony of
marriage, which, as we know, justifies most things.

83

VII.

T7SIAKB SIKaS.

When the kissing operation was finished — ^by the way,
none of the young ladies offered to pet me in this fashibn,
though I saw one hovering round Job, to that respectable
individual's evident alarm — the old man Billali advanced,
and graciously wayed us into the cave, whither we went,
followed by Ustane, who did not seem inclined to take
the liints I gave her that we liked privacy.

Before we had gone five paces it struck me that the
cave that we were entering was none of Nature's handiwork,
but, oh the contrary, had been hollowed by the hand of
man. So far as we could judge it appeared to be about
one hundred feet in length by fifty wide, and very lofty,
resembling a cathedral aisle more than anything else.
From this mam aisle opened passages at a distance of every
twelve or fifteen feet, leading, I supposed, to smaller cham-
bers. About fifty feet from the entrance of the cave, just
where the light began to get dim, a fire was burning, which
threw huge shadows upon the gloomy walls around. Hero
Billali halted, and asked us to be seated, saying that the
people would bring us food, and accordingly we squatted
ourselves down upon the rugs of skins which were spread
for us, and waited. Presently the food, consisting of goat's
flesh boiled, fresh milk in an earthenware pot, and boiled
cobs of Indian corn, was brought by young girls. We
w^ere almost starving, and I do not think that I ever in my
life before ate with such satisfaction. Indeed, before we
had finishfid we literally ate up everything that was set
before us.

When we had done, our somewhat saturnine host, Billali,
who bad been watching us in perfect silence, rose aiid

84 -. SHE

addressed us. He said that it was a wonderful thing that
Lad happened. No man had ever known or heard of white
strangers arriving in the country of the People of the Eocks,
Sometimes, though rarely, black men had come here, and
from them they had heard of the existence of men mucli
whiter than themselves, who sailed on the sea in ships, but
for the arrival ot such there was no precedent. We had,
however, been seen dragging the boat up the canal, and he
told us frankly that he had at once given orders for our
destruction, seeing that it was unlawful for any stranger
to enter here, when a message had come from ' She-who-
must-be-obeyed,' saying that our lives were to be spared,
and that we were to be brought hither.

' Pardon me, my father,' I interrupted at this point ;
'but if, &a 1 xmdierstaxidi, " She-who-must-be-obeyed " lives
yet farther off, how could she have known of our
approach ? '

BUlaU turned, and seeing that we were alone— for the
young lady, Ustane, had withdrawn when he had begun to
speak — said, with a curious Httle laugh —

' Are there none in your land who can see without eyes
and hear without ears ? Ask no questions ; S/ie knew.'

I shrugged my shoulders at this, and he proceeded to
say that no further instructions had been received on the
subject of our disposal, and this being so he was about
to start to interview ' She-who-must-be-obeyed,' generally
spoken of, for the sake of brevity, as ' Hiya ' or She simply,
who he gave us to understand was the Queen of the
Amahagger, and learn her wishes.

I asked him how long he proposed to be away, and he
said that by travelling hard he might be back on the fifth
day, but there were many miles of marsh to cross before
he came to where She was. He then said that every
arrangement would be made for our comfort during his
absence, and that, as he personally had taken a fancy to
us, he sincerely trusted that the answer he should bring
from She would be one favourable to the continuation of
our existence, but at the same time he did not wish to

VSTANE SINGS 85

conceal from us that he thought this douhtful, as every
stranger who had ever come into the country during his
grandmother's Ufe, his mother's life, and his own life, had
been put to death without mercy, and in a way that he
would not harrow our feelings by describing ; and this had
been done by the order of Sine herself, at least he supposed
it was by her order. At any rate, she never interfered to
save them.

' Why,' I said, ' but how can that be ? You are an old
man, and the time you talk of must reach back three men's
lives. How therefore could She have ordered the death of
anybody at the beginning of the life of your grandmother,
seeing that herself she would not have been bom ? '

Again he smiled— that same faint, peculiar smile, and
with a deep bow departed, without making any answer ;
nor did we see him again for five days.
" When he had gone we discussed the situation, which
filled me with alarm. I did not at all hke the accounts of
this mysterious Queen, ' She-who-must-be-obeyed,' or more
shortly She, who apparently ordered the execution of any
unfortunate stranger in a fashion so unmerciful. Leo,
too, was depressed about it, but proceeded to console him-
self by triumphantly pointing out that this She was un-
doubtedly the person referred to in the writing on the
potsherd and in his father's letter, in proof of which he
advanced Billah's allusions to her age and power. I was
by this time so overwhelmed with the whole course of
events that I had not even got the heart left to dispute a
proposition so absurd, so I suggested that we should try
and go out and get a bath, of which we all stood sadly in
need.

Accordingly, having indicated our wish to a middle-
aged individual of an unusually saturnine cast of counten-
ance, even among this saturnine people, who appeared to
be deputed to look after us now that the Father of the
hamlet had departed, we started in a body— having first
lit our pipes. Outside the cave we found quite a crowd of
people evidently watching for our appearance, but when

86 SHE •■

tliey saw us come out smoking they vanished this way and
that, calling out that we were great magicians. Indeed-,
nothing about us- created so great a sensation as our tobacbo
smoke — not even our firearms.' After this we succeeded
in reaching a stream that had its source in a strong ground
spring, and talring our bath in peace, though some of the
women, not excepting Ustane, showed a decided inclination
to follow us even there.

By the time that we had finished this most refreshing
bath the sun was setting ; indeed, when we got back to the
big cave it had already set. The cave itself was full of
people gathered round fires — for several more had now been
lighted — and eating their evening meal by their lurid light,
and by that of various lamps which were set about or hung
upon the walls. These lamps were of a rude manufacture
of baked earthenware, and of all shapes, some of them
graceful enough. The larger ones were formed of big red
earthenware pots, filled with clarified melted fat, and ha-vdng
a reed wick stuck through a wooden disk which filled the
top of the pot, and this sort of lamp required the most
constant attention to prevent its going out whenever the
wick burnt down, as there were no means of turning it up.
The smaller hand lamps, however, which were also made
of baked clay, were fitted -with wicks manufactured from the
pith of a palm-tree, or sometimes from the stem of a very
handsome variety of fern. This kind of wick was passed
through a round hole at the end of the lamp, to which a
sharp piece of hard wood was attached wherewith to pierce
and draw it up whenever it showed signs of burning low.

For a ■9\fhile we sat down and watched this grim people
eating their evening meal in silence as grim as themselves,
till at length, getting tired of contemplating them and the
huge moving shadows on the rocky walls, I suggested to
our new keeper that we should like to go to bed.

' We found tobacco gro-wing in this country as it does in every
other part of Africa, and, although they are so absolutely ignorant of
its other blessed qualities, the Amahagger use it habitually in the
form of snuff, and also for medicinal purposes. — L. H. H.

USTANE SINGS 87

Witliout a word he rose, and, taking me politely by tlie
hand, advanced with a lamp to one of the small passages
that I had noticed opening out of the central cave. This
we followed for about five paces, when it suddenly widened
out into a small chamber, about eight feet square, and
hewn out of the living rock. On one side of this chamber
was a stone slab, about three feet from the ground, and
rmmmg its entire length like a bmik in a cabin, and on
this slab he intimated that I was to sleep. There was no
window or air-hole to the chamber, and no furniture ; and,
on looking at it more closely, I came to the disturbing con-
clusion (in which, as I afterwards discovered, I was quite
right) that it had originally served for a sepulchre for the
dead rather than a sleeping-place for the living, the slab
being designed to receive the corpse of the departed. The
thought made rne shudder in spite of myself ; but, seeintj
that I must sleep somewhere, I got over the feeling as best
I might, and returned to the cavern to get my blanket,
whicli had been brought up from the boat with the other
things. There I met Job, who, having been inducted to a
similar apartment, had flatly declined to stop in it, saying
that the look of the place gave him the horrors, and that he
might as well be dead and buried in his grandfather's brick
grave at once, and expressed his determination of sleeping
with me if I would allow him. This, of course, I was only
too glad to do.

The night passed very comfortably on the whole. I
say on the whole, for personally I went through a most
horrible nightmare of being buried alive, induced, no
doubt, by the sepulchral nature of my surroundings. At
da-wn we were aroused by a loud trumpeting sound, pro-
duced, as we afterwards discovered, by a young Amahagger
blowing through a hole bored in its side into a hollowed
elephant tusk, which was kept for the purpose.

Taking the hint, we got up and went down to the stream
to wash, after which the morning meal was served. At
breakfast one of the women, no longer quite young, ad-
vanced, and publicly kissed Job. I think it was in its

88 SHE

way the most delightful thing (putting its impropriety aside
for a moment) that I ever saw. Never shall I forget the
respectable Job's abject terror and disgust. Job, like
myself; is a bit of a mysogynist — I fancy chiefly owing to
the fact of his having been one of a family of seventeen —
and the feeUngs expressed upon his countenance when he
realised that he was not only being embraced pubhcly, and
without authorisation on his own part, but also in the pre-
sence of his masters, were too mixed and painful to admit
of accurate description. He sprang to his feet, and pushed
the woman, a buxom person of about thirty, from him.

' Well, I never ! ' he gasped, whereupon probably think-
ing that he was only coy, she embraced him again.

' Be off with you ! Get away, you minx 1 ' he shouted,
waving the wooden spoon, with which he was eating his
breakfast, up and down before the lady's face. ' Beg your
pardon, gentlemen, I am sure I haven't encouraged her.
Oh, Lord ! she's coming for me again. Hold her, Mr.
Holly ! please hold her ! I can't stand it ; I can't, indeed.
This has never happened to me before, gentlemen, never.
There's nothing against my character,' and here he broke
off, and ran as hard as he could go down the cave, and for
once I saw the Amahagger laugh. As for the woman, how-
ever, she did not laugh. On the contrary, she seemed to
bristle with fury, which the mockery of the other women
about only served to intensify. She stood there hteraUy
snarling and shaking with indignation, and, seeing her, I
wished Job's scruples had been at Jericho, forming a
shrewd guess that his admirable behaviour had endangered
our throats. Nor, as the sequel shows, was I wrong.

The lady having retreated, Job returned in a great
state of nervousness, and keeping his weather eye fixed
upon every woman who came near him. I took an oppor-
tunity to explain to our hosts that Job was a married man,
and had had very mihappy experiences in his domestic
relations, which accounted for his presence here and his
terror at the sight of women, but my remarks were
received in grim silence, it being evident that our retainer's

VSTANE SINGS 89

behaviour -was considered as a slight to the ' household '
at large, although the women, after the manner of some
of their more civilised sisters, made merry at the rebuff
of their companion.

After breakfast wc took a walk and inspected the Ama-
liagger herds, and also their cultivated lands. They have
two breeds of cattle, one large and angular, with no horns,
but yielding beautiful milk ; and the other, a red breed,
very small and fat, excellent for meat, but of no value for
millring purposes. This last breed closely resembles the
Norfolk red-pole strain, only it has horns which generally
curve forward over the head, sometimes to such an extent
that they have to be out to prevent them from growing
into the bones of the skull. The goats are long-haired,
and are used for eating only, at least I never saw them
milked. As for the Amahagger cultivation, it is primitive
in the extreme, being all done by means of a spade made
of iron, for these people smelt and work iron. This spade
is shaped more like a big spear-head than anything else,
and has no shoulder to it on which the foot can be set. As
a consequence, the labour of digging is very great. It is,
however, all done by the men, the women, contrary to the
habits of most savage races, being entirely exempt from
manual toil. But then, as I think I have said elsewhere,
among the Amahagger the weaker sex has established its
rights.

At first we were much puzzled as to the origin and
constitution of this extraordinary race, points upon which
they were singularly uncommunicative. As the time went
on — for the next four days passed without any striking
event — we learnt something from Leo's lady friend Ustane,
who, by the way, stuck to that young gentleman like his
own shadow. As to origin, they had none, at least, so far
as she was aware. There were, however, she informed us,
mounds of masonry and many pillars near the place where
She lived, which was called Kor, and which the wise said
had once been houses wherein men lived, and it was sug-
gested that they were descended from these men. No one,

go- SHE

however, dared go near these . ^eat ruing, because they
were haunted : they only looked on them from a distance.
Other similar ruins were to be seen, she had heard, in
various parts of the country, that is, wherever one of the
mountains rose above the level of the swamp. Also the
eaves in which they lived had been hollowed out of the
rooks by men, perhaps the same who built the cities.
They themselves had no written laws, only custom, which
was, however, quite as binding as law. If any man
offended against the custom, he was put to death by order
of the Father of the 'Household.' I asked how he was
put to death, and she only smiled, and said that I might
see one day soon.

They had a Queen, however. She was their Queen,
but she was very rarely seen, perhaps once in two or three
years, when she came forth to pass sentence on some
offenders, and when seen was muffled up in a big cloak, so
that nobody could look upon her face. Those who waited
upon her were deaf and dumb, and therefore could tell no
tales, but it was reported that she was lovely as no other
woman was lovely, or ever had been. It was rumoured
also that she was immortal, and had power over all things,
but she, Ustane, could say nothing of aU that. What slie
believed was that the Queen chose a husband from time to
time, and as soon as a female child was born this husband,
who was never again seen, was put to death. Then the
female child grew up and took the place of the Queen when
its mother died, and had been buried in the great caves.
But of these matters none could speak for certain. Only
She was obeyed throughout the length and breadth of the
land, and to question her command was certain death.
She kept a guard, but had no regular army, and to disobey
her was to die.

I asked what size the land was, and how many people
lived in it. She answered that there were ten ' House-
holds,' like this that she knew of, including the big ' House-
hold,' where the Queen was, that all the ' Households '
lived in oaves, in places resembling this stretch of raised

VSTANE SINGS 91

country, dotted about in a vast extent of swamp, whioli was
only to be threaded by secret paths. Often the ' House-
holds ' made war on each other until She sent word that it
was to stop, and then they instantly ceased. That and the
fever which they caught in crossing the swamps prevented
their numbers from increasing too much. They had no
connection with any other race, indeed none lived near
them, or were able to thread the vast swamps. Once an
army from the direction of the great river (presumably the
Zambesi) had attempted to attack them, but they got lost
in the marshes, and at night, seeing the great balls of fire
that move about there, tried to come to them, thinking that
they marked the enemy's camp, and half of them were
drowned. As for the rest, they soon died of fever and
starvation, not a blow being struck at them. The marshes,
she told us, were absolutely impassable except to those who
knew the paths, adding, what I could well beUeve, that we
should never have reached this place where we then were
had we not been brought thither.

These and many other things we learnt from Ustane
during the four days' pause before our real adventures be-
gan, and, as may be imagined, they gave us considerable
cause for thought. The whole thing was exceedingly
remarkable, almost incredibly so, indeed, and the oddest
part of it was that so far it did more or less correspond to
the ancient writing on the sherd. And now it appeared
that there was a mysterious Queen clothed by rumour with
dread and wonderful attributes, and commonly known by
the impersonal but, to my mind, rather awesome title of
She. Altogether, I could not make it out, nor could Leo,
though of course he was exceedingly triumphant over me
becau^ I had persistently mocked at the whole thing. As
for Job, he had long since abandoned any attempt to call
his reason his own, and left it to drift upon the sea of cir-
cumstance. Mahomed, the Arab, who was, by the way,
treated civiUy indeed, but with chiUing contempt, by the
Aniahagger, was, I discovered, in a great fright, though I
could not quite make out what he Avas frightened about.

92 SHE

He would sit crouolied up in a corner of the cave all day
long, calling upon Allah and the Prophet to protect him.
When I pressed him about it, he said that he was afraid
because these people were not men and women at all, but
devils, and that this was an enchanted land ; and, upon
my word, once or twice since then I have been inclined to
agree with him. And so the time went on, till the night
of the fourth day after Billali had left, when something
happened.

We three and Ustane were sitting round a fire in the
cave just before bedtime, when suddenly the woman, who
had been brooding in silence, rose, and laid her hand
upon Leo's golden curls, and addressed him. Even now,
when I shut my eyes, I can see her proud, imperial form,
clothed alternately in dense shadow and the red flickering
of the fire, as she stood, the wUd centre of as weird a scene
as I ever witnessed, and delivered herself of the burden of
her thoughts and forebodings in a kind of rhythmical
epeeoh that ran something as follows : —

Thou art my chosen — I Jiave waited for thee from the

beginning !
Thou art very beautiful. Who hath hair like unto thee,

or shin so white ?
Who hath so strong an arm, who is so much a man ?
Thine eyes are the sky, and the light in them is the

stars.
Thou art perfect and of a happy face, and my heart

turned itself towards thee.
Ay, when mine eyes fell on thee I did desire thee, —
Then did I take thee to me — thou, my Beloved,
And hold thee fast, lest Jiarm should come unto thee.
Ay, I did cover thine head with mine hair, lest the sun

should strike it;
And altogether was I thine, and thou wast altogether

mine.
And so it went for a little space, till Time loas in labour

with an evil Day ;

USTANE SINGS 93

Ani then lohat befell on that day ? Alas ! my Beloved,
I hiow not!

But I, I saw thee no more — I, I was lost in the blacTc-
ness.

And she who is stronger did taJce thee ; ay, she who is
fairer than Ustane.

Yet didst thou turn and call upon me, and let thine
eyes wander in the darhness.

But, nevertheless, she prevailed by Beauty, and led thee
down horrible places.

And then, ah ! then my Beloved

Here this extraordinary woman broke off her speech, or
chant, which was so much musical gibberish to us, for all
that we understood of what she was talking about, and
seemed to fix her flashing eyes upon the deep shadow before
her. Then in a moment they acquired a vacant, terrified
stare, as though they were striving to realise some half-seen
horror. She lifted her hand from Leo's head, and pointed
into the darkness. We all looked, and could see nothing ;
but she saw something, or thought she did, and something
evidently that affected even her iron nerves, for, wiiliout
another sound, down she feU senseless between us.

Leo, who was growing reaUy attached to this remark-
able young person, was in a great state of alarm and
distress, and I, to be perfectly candid, was in a condition
not far removed from superstitious fear. The whole scene
was an im.canny one.

Presently, however, she recovered, and sat up with an
extraordinary convulsive shudder.

' What didst tliou mean, Ustane ? ' asked Leo, who,
thanks to years of tuition, spoke Arabic very prettily.

' Nay, my chosen,' she answered with a little forced
laugh. ' I did but sing imto thee after the fashion of my
people. Surely, I meant nothing. How could I speak of
that which is not yet ? '

' And what didst thou see, Ustane ? ' I asked, looking
her sharply in the face.

' Nay,' she answered again ; ' I saw naught. Ask me

94 SHE

not what I saw. Why should I fright ye ? ' And then,
turning to Leo with a look of the most utter tenderness
that I ever saw upon the face of a woman, civilised or
savage, she took his head between her hands, and kissed
him on the forehead as a mother might. ' When I am
gone from thee, my chosen ; when at night thou stretchest
out thine hand and canst not find me, then shouldst thou
think at times of me, for of a truth I love thee well,
though I be not fit to wash thy feet. And now let us love
and take that which is given us, and be happy ; for in the
grave there is no love and no warmth, nor any touching
of the lips. Nothing perchance, or perchance but bitter
memories of what might have been. To-night the hours
are our own, how know we to whom they shall belong
to-morrow ?

95

VIII.

THE FEAST, AND AFTBS 1

On the day following this remarkable scene— a scene cal-
culated to make a deep impression npon anybody who
beheld it, more because of what it suggested and seemed
to foreshadow than of what it revealed — it was announced
to us that a feast would be held that evening in our honour.
I did my best to get out of it, saying that we were modest
people, and cared little for feasts, but my remarks being
received witk the silence of displeasure, I thought it wisest
to hold my tongue.

Accordingly, just before sundown, I was informed that
everything was ready, and, accompanied by Job, went into
the cave, where I met Leo, who was, as usual, followed
by Ustane. These two had been out walking some-
where, and knew nothing of the projected festivity till that
moment. When Ustane heard of it I saw an expression
of horror spring up upon her handsome features. Turn-
ing, she caught a man who was passing up the cave by the
arm, and asked him something in an imperious tone. His
answer seemed to reassure her a little, for she looked
relieved, though far from satisfied. Next she appeared to
attempt some remonstrance with the man, who was a
person in authority, but he spoke angrily to her, and
shook her off, and then changing his mind, led her by th&
arm, and sat her down between himself and another man
in the circle round the fire, and I perceived that for some
re^on of her own she thought it best to submit.

The fire in the cave was an unusually big one tha-t
nigbt, and in a large circle round it wefe gathered about

96 SHE

tliirty-fivc men and twojwomen^Ustane and the woman to
avoid whom Job hadplayed the r6le of another Scriptm-al
character. The men were sitting in perfect silence, as
was their custom, each with his great spear stuck upright
behind him, in a socket cut in the rook for that purpose.
Only one or two wore the yellowish linen garment of
which I have spoken, the rest had nothing on except the
leopard's skin about the middle.

' What's up now, sir ? ' said Job, doubtfully. ' Bless
us and save us, there's that woman again. Now, surely,
she can't be after me, seeing that I have given her no
encouragement. They give me the creeps, the whole lot
of them, and that's a fact. Why, look, they have asked
Mahomed to dine, too. There, that lady of mine is talk-
ing to him in as nice and civil a way as possible. Well,
I'm glad it isn't me, that's all.'

We looked up, and sure enough the woman in question
had risen, and was escorting the wretched Mahomed from
the corner, where, overcome by some acute prescience of
horror, he had been seated, shivering, and calling on Allah.
He appeared unwUluig enough to come, if for no other
reason perhaps because it was an unaccustomed honour,
for hitherto his food had been given to him apart. Any-
way I could see that he was in a state of great terror, for
his tottering legs would scarcely support his stout, bulky
form, and I think it was rather owing to the resources of
barbarism behind him, in the shape of a huge Amahagger
with a proportionately huge spear, than to the seduction
of the lady who led him by the hand, that he consented
to come at all.

' Well,' I said to the others, ' I don't at all like the look
of things, but I suppose that we must face it out. Have
you fellows got your revolvers on ? because, if so, you had
better see that they are loaded.'

' I have, sir,' said Job, tapping his Colt, ' but Mr. Leo
has only got his hunting-knife, though that is big eno%h,
surely.'

Feeling that it would not do to wait while the missing

THE FEAST, AND AFTER 97

weapon was fetched, we advanced boldly, and seated
ourselves in a line, with our backs against the side of the
cave.

As soon as we were seated, an earthenware jar was
passed round containing a fermented fluid, of by no means
unpleasant taste, though apt to turn upon the stomach,
made of crushed grain — not Indian corn, but a small brown
grain that grows upon the stem in clusters, not unlike that
which in the southern part of Africa is known by the name
of Kafir com. The vase in which this liquid was handed
round was very curious, and as it more or less resembled many
hundreds of others in use among the Amahagger I may as
well describe it. These vases are of a very ancient manu-
facture, and of all sizes. None such can have been made
in the country for hundreds, or rather thousands, of years.
They are found in the rock tombs, o|, which I shall give a
description in their proper place, and my own belief is that,
after the fashion of the Egyptians, with whom the former
inhabitants of this country may have had some connection,
they were used to receive the viscera of the dead. Leo,
however, is of opinion that, as in the case of Etruscan
amphorsa, they were placed there for the spiritual use of the
deceased. They are mostly two-handled, and of all sizes,
some being nearly three feet in height, and running from
that down to as many inches. In shape they vary, but are
all exceedingly beautiful and graceful, being made of a very
fine black ware, not lustrous, but shghtly rough. On tlii'-
grouudwork were inlaid figures much more graceful ami
liielike than any others I have seen on antique vases. Some
of these inlaid pictures represented love-scenes with a child-
like simplicity and freedom of manner which would not
commend itself to the taste of the present day. Others
again were pictures of maidens dancing, and yet others of
hunting-scenes. For instance, the very vase from which
■nc were then drinking had on one side a most spirited
dra-«fcg of men, apparently white in colour, attacking a
bull- elephant with spears, while on the reverse was a picture,
not quite so well done, of a hunter shooting an arrow at a

H

9S SHE

running antelope, I should say from the look of it either an
eland or a koodoo.

This is a digression at a critical moment, but it is not
too long for the occasion, for the occasion itself was very
long. With the exception of the periodical passing of the
vase, and the movement necessary to throw fuel on to the
fife, nothing happened for the best |)art of a whole hour.
Nobody spoke a word. There we all sat in perfect silence,
staring at the glare and glow of the large fire, and at the
shadows thrown by the flickering earthenware lamps
(which, by the way, were not ancient). On the open space
between us and the fire lay a large wooden tray, with four
short handles to it, exactly like a butcher's tray, only not
hollowed out. By the side of the tray was a great pair of
long-handled iron pincers, and on the other side of the fire
was a similar pair. I^omehow I did not at all like the ap-
pearance of this tray and the accompanying pincers. There
I sat and stared at them and at the silent circle of the fierce
moody faces of the men, and reflected that it was all very
awful, and that we were absolutely in the power of this
alarming people, who, to me at any rate, were all the more
formidable because their true character was still very much
of a mystery to us. They might be better than I thought
them, or they might be worse. I feared that they were
worse, and I was not wrong. It was a curious sort of a
feast, I reflected, in appearance, indeed, an entertainment
of the Barmecide stamp, for there was absolutely nothing
to eat.

At last, just as I was begimiingto feel as though I were
being mesmerised, a move was made. Without the sUghtest
warning, a man from the other side of the circle called out
in a loud voice —

' Where is the flesh that we shall eat ? '

Thereon everybody in the circle answered in a deep
measured tone, and stretching out the right arm towards
the fire as he spoke —

' The flesh will conie.'

' Is it a goat ? ' said the same man,

THE FEASr, AND AFTER 99

' It is a goat without horns, and more than a goat, and
ivc shall slay it,' they answered witli one voice, and turning
half round they one and all grasped the handles of their
spears with the right hand, and then simultaneously let
them go.

'I^it an ox ? ' said the man again.

' It is an ox ivitJi^it horns, and more than an ox, and
toe shall slay it,' was the answer, and again the spears were
grasped, and again let go.

Then came a pause, and I noticed, with horror and a
rising of the hair, that the woman next to Mahomed began
to fondle him, patting his cheeks, and calling him by names
of endearment, while her fierce eyes played up and down
his trembling form. 1 do not know why the sight frightened
me so, but it did frighten us all dreadfully, especially Leo.
The caressing was so snake-like, and so evidently a part of
some ghastly formula that had to be gone through.' I saw
Mahomed turn white under his brown skin, sickly white
with fear^

' Is the meat ready to be cooked ? ' asked the voice,
more rapidly.

' It is ready ; it is ready.'

' Is the pot hot to cook it ? ' it continued, in a sort of
scream that echoed painfully down the great recesses of the
care.
• 'Itis hot ; it is hot.'

' Great heavens ! ' roared Leo, ' remember the writing,
" Thexieoi^le whoplacepots u;pon the heads of strangers." '

As he said the words, before we could stir, or. even take
the matter in, two great ruffians jumped up, and, seizing
the long pincers, plmiged them into the heart of the fire,
and the woman who had been caressing Mahomed suddenly
produced a fibre noose from under her girdle or moocha,
and, shpping it over his shoulders, ran it tight, while the

' wll afterwards learnt that its object was to pretend to the victim
that he was the object of love and admiration, and so to soothe his
injured feelings, and cause him to expire in a happy and contented
frame of mind;— L. H. H.

H 2

loo ' SHE

men next him seized him by the legs. The two men with
the pincers gave a heave, and, scattering the fire this way
and that upon the rocky floor, lifted from it a large earthen-
ware pot, heated to a white heat. In an instant, almost
with a single movement, they had reached the spot where
Mahomed was struggling. He fought like a fiend, shrieldng
in the abandonment of his despairjgand notwithstanding
the noose round him, and the efforts of the men who
held his legs, the advancing wretches were for the moment
unable to accomplish their purpose, which, horrible and
incredible as it seems, was to put the red-hot pot upon his
head.

I sprang to my feet with a yell of horror, and drawing
my revolver fired it by a sort of instinct straight at the
diabolical woman who had been caressing Mahomed, and
was now gripping him in her arms. The bullet struck her
in the back and killed her, and to this day I am glad that
it did, for, as it afterwards transpired, she had availed her-
self of the anthropophagous customs of the Amahagger to
organise the whole thing in revenge of the slight put upon
her by Job. She sank down dead, and as she did so, to my
terror and dismay, Mahomed, by a superhuman effort, burst
from his tormentors, and, springing high into the air, fell
dying upon her corpse. The heavy bullet from my pistol
had driven through the bodies of both, at once striking down
the murdress, and saving her victim from a death a hundred
times more horrible. It was an awful and yet a most mer-
ciful accident.

For a moment there was a silence of astonishment.
The Amahagger had never heard the report of a firearm
before, and its effects dismayed them. But the next a man
close to us recovered himself, and seized his spear pre-
]5aratory to making a lunge with it at Leo, who was the
nearest to him.

' Eunfor it 1 ' I shouted, setting the example by starting
up the cave as hard as my legs would carry me. I would
have made for the open air if it had been possible, but
there were men in the wajr, ana, besides, I iiad caught

THE FEAST, AND AFTER lOi

sight of the forms of a crowd of people standing out clear
against the skyline beyond the entrance to the cave. Up
the cave I went, and after me came the others, and after
them thundered the whole crowd of cannibals, mad with
fury at the death of the woman. With a bound I cleared
the prostrate form of Mahomed. As I flew over him I felt
the heat from the red hot pot, which was lying close by,
strike upon my legs, and by its glow saw his hands — for lie
was not quite dead — still feebly moving. At the top of the
cave was a little platform of rock three feet or so high by
about eight deep, on which two large lamps were placed at
night. Whether this platform had been left as a seat, or as
a raised point afterwards to be cut away when it had served
its purpose as a standing-place from which to carry on
the excavations, I do not know — at least, I did not then.
At any rate, we aU three reached it, and, jumping on it,
prepared to sell our lives as dearly as we could. For a few
seconds the crowd that was pressing on our heels hung
back "when they saw us face round upon them. Job was
on one side of the rock to the left, Leo in the centre, and
I to the right. Behind us were the lamps. Leo bent
forward, and looked down the long lane of shadows, ter-
minated in the fire and lighted lamps, through which the
quiet forms of our would-be murderers flitted to and fro
with the faint light glinting on their spears, for even their
fury was silent as a bulldog's. The only other thing
visible was the red-hot pot still glowing angrily in the
gloom. There was a curious light in Leo's eyes, and his
handsome face was set like a stone. In his right hand was
his heavy hunting-knife. He shifted its thong a little up
his wrist, and then put his arm round me and gave me a
good hug.

' Good-bye, old fellow,' he said, ' my dear friend — ^my
more than father. We have no chance against those
scoundrels ; they will finish us in a few minutes, and eat
us E^erwards, I suppose. Good-bye. I led you into this.
I hTope you will forgive me. Good-bye, Job.'

' God's will be done,' I said, setting my teeth, as I

102 - SHE

prepared for the end. At tLat moment, with an excla-
mation, Job lifted his revolver and fired, and hit a man-
not the man he had aimed at, by the way : anything that
Job shot at was perfectly safe.

On they came with a rush, and I fired too as fast as I
could, and checked them — between us. Job and I, besides
the woman, killed or mortally wounded five men with our
pistols before they were emptied. But we had no time
to reload, and they still came on in a way that was almost
splendid in its reoldessness, seeing that they did not Imow
but that we could go on firing for ever.

A great fellow bounded up upon the platform, and Leo
struck him dead with one blow of his powerful arm,
sending the knife right through him. I did the same by
another, but Job missed his stroke, and I saw a brawny
Amahagger, grip him by the middle and whirl him off the
rock. The knife not being secured by a thong fell from
Job's hand as he did so, and, by a most happy accident for
him, Ht upon its handle on the rock, just as the body of
the Amahagger being undermost, hit upon its point and
was transfixed upon it. What happened to Job after that
1 am sure I do not know, but my own impression is that
he lay stUl upon the corpse of his deceased assailant,
' playing 'possum ' as the Americans say. As for myself,
I was soon involved in a desperate encounter with two
ruffians who, luckily for me, had left their spears behind
them ; and for the first time in my life the great physical
power with which Nature has endowed me stood me in
good stead. I had hacked at the head of one man with
my hunting-knife, which was almost as big and heavy as
a short sword, with such vigour, that the sharp steel had
split his skull down to the eyes, and was held so fast by
it that as he suddenly fell sideways the knife was twisted
right out of my hand.

Then it was that the two others sprang upon me. I
saw them coming, and got an arm round the waist of^ach,
and do'Nvn we all fell upon the floor of the cave together,
roUing over and over. They were strong men, but I was

THE FEAST, AND AFTER 103

mad with rage, and that awful lust for slaughter which will
creep into the hearts of the most civilised of us when blows
are flying, and life and death tremble on the turn. My
arms were round the two swarthy demons, and I hugged
them till I heard their ribs crack and crunch up beneath my
gripe. They twisted and writhed like snakes, and clawed
and battered at me with their fists, but I held on. Lying
on my back there, so that their bodies might protect me
from spear thrusts from above, I slowly crushed the life
out of them, and as I did so, strange as it may seem, I
thought of what the amiable Head of my College at
Cambridge (who is a member of the Peace Society) and
my brother Fellows would say if by clairvoyance they
could see me, of all men, playing such a bloody game.
Soon my assailants grew faint, and almost ceased to
struggle, their breath had failed them, and they were
dying, but still I dared not leave them, for they died
very slowly. I knew that if I relaxed my grip they would
revive. The other ruffians probably thought — for we were
all three lying in the shadow of the ledge — that we were
all dead together, at any rate they did not interfere with
our Httle tragedy.

I turned my head, and as I lay gasping in the throes of
that awful struggle I could see that Leo was off the rock
now, for the lamplight fell full upon him. He was still on
his feet, but in the centre of a surging mass of struggling
men, who were striving to pull him down as wolves puU
down a stag. Up above them towered his beautiful pale
face crowned with its bright curls (for Leo is six feet
two high), and I saw that he was fighting with a desperate
abandonment and energy that was at once splendid andg
hideous to behold. He drove his knife through one man —
they were so close to him and mixed up with him that
they could not get at him to kill him with their big spears,
and they had no knives or sticks. The man fell, and then
somehow the knife was wrenched from Ms hand, leaving
him defenceless, and I thought the end had come. But
no ; with a desperate effort he broke loose from them,

104 SHE

seized the body of the man he had just slain, and liftiiig it
high in the air hurled it right at the mob of his assailants,
so that the shock and weight of it swept some five or six
of them to the earth. But in a minute they were all up
again, except one, whose skull was smashed, and had once
more fastened upon him. And then slowly, and with
infinite labour and struggling, the wolves bore the lion
down. Once even then he recovered himself, and felled an
Amahagger with his fist, but it was more than man could
do to hold his own for long against so many, and at last
he came crashing down upon the rock floor, falling as an
oak falls, and bearing with him to the earth all those who
clung about him. They gripped him by his arms and legs,
and then cleared off his body.

' A spear,' cried a voice — ' a spear to out his throat,
and a vessel to catch his blood.'

I shut my eyes, for I saw the man coming with a spear,
and myself, I could not stir to Leo's help, for I was grow-
ing weak, and the two men on me were not yet dead, and
a deadly sickness overcame me.

Then suddenly there was a disturbance, and involun-
tarily I opened my eyes again, and looked towards the
scene of murder. The girl Ustane had thrown herself on
Leo's prostrate form, covering his body with her body, and
fastening her arms about his neck. They tried to drag
her from him, but she twisted her legs round his, and
hung on like a bulldog, or rather like a creeper to a tree,
and they could not. Then they tried to stab him in the
side without hurting her, but somehow she shielded him,
and he was only wounded.

At last they lost patience.

'Drive the spear through the man and the woman
together,' said a voice, the same voice that had asked the
questions at that ghastly feast, ' so of a verity shall they
be wed.'

Then I saw the man with the weapon straighten him-
self for the effort. I saw the cold steel gleam on high, and
once more I shut my eyes.

THE FEAST, AND AFTER 103

As I did so I heard tlie voice of a man thunder out
in tones that rang and echoed down the rocky ways—

' Cease I '

Then I fainted, and as I did so it flashed through my
darkening mind that I was passing down into the last
oblivion of death.

io6 SHE

IX,

A LITTLE FOOT.

When I opened my eyes again I found myself lying on a
skin mat not far from tlie fire round •whioli we had been
gathered for that dreadful feast. Near me lay Leo, still
apparently in a swoon, and over him was bending the tall
form of the girl Ustane, who was washing a deep spear
wound in his side with cold water preparatory to binding it
up with linen. Leaning against the wall of the cave behind
her was Job, apparently uninjured, but bruised and tremb-
lingi On the other side of the fire, tossed about this way
and that, as though they had thrown themselves down
to sleep in some moment of absolute exhaustion, were the
bodies of those whom we had killed in our frightful struggle
for life. I counted them : there were twelve beside the
woman, and the corpse of poor Mahomed, who had died by
my hand, which, the fire-stained pot at its side, was placed
at the end of the irregular line. To the left a body of men
were engaged in binding the arms of the survivors of the
cannibals behind them, and then fastening them two and
two. The villains were submitting with a look of sulky
indifference upon their faces which accorded ill with the
baffled fury that gleamed in their sombre eyes. la. front
of these men, directing the operations, stood no other than
our friend BUlali, looking rather tired, but particularly
patriarchal with his flowing beard, and as cool and tmcon-
cerned as though he were superintending the cutting up of
an ox.

Presently he tunaed, and perceiving that I was sitting
up advanced to me, and with the utmost courtesy said

A LITTLE FOOT 107

that ha trusted that I felt better. I answered that at
present I scarcely knew how I felt, except that I ached all
overi

Then he bent down and examined Leo's wound.

'It is a nasty cut,' he said, ' but the spear has not
pierced the entrails. He will recover.'

' Thanks to thy arrival, my father,' I answered. ' In
another minute we should all have been beyond the reach
of recovery, for those devils of thme would have slain us
as they would have slain our servant,' and I pointed
towards Mahomed.

The old man ground his teeth, and I saw an extraordi-
nary expression of malignity light up his eyes.

' Pear not, my son,' he answered, ' Vengeance shall
be taken on them such as would make the flesh twist upon
the bones merely to hear of it. To She shall they go, and
her vengeance shall be worthy of her greatness. That
man,' pointing to Mahomed, ' I tell thee that man would
have died a merciful death to the death these hyaena-men
shall die. Tell me, I pray of thee, how it came about.'

In a few words I sketched what had happened.

' Ah, so,' he answered. ' Thou seest, my son, here
there is a custom that if a stranger comes into this country
he may be slain by " the pot," and eaten.'

' It is hospitality turned upside down,' I answered feebly.
' In our country we entertain a stranger, and give him
food to eat. Here ye eat him, and are entertained.'

' It is a custom,' he answered, with a shrug. ' Myself
I think it an evil one ; but then,' he added by an after-
tliought, ' I do not like the taste of strangers, especially
after they have wandered through the swamps and lived
on wildfowl. When She-who-must-be-obeyed sent orders
tliat ye were to be saved aHve she said naught of the black
man, therefore, being hytenas, these men lusted after his
flesh, and the woman it was, whom thou didst rightly
slay, who put it into their evil hearts to hot-pot him.
"Well, they will have their reward. Better for them would
it bo if they had never seen the light than that they

io8 SHE

should stand before She in lier terrible anger. Happy are
those of them who died by your hands.

'Ah,' he went on, ' it was a gallant fight that ye fought.
Knowest thou, that thou, long-armed old baboon that thou
art, hast crushed in the ribs of those two who are laid out
there as though they were but as the shell on an egg ? And
the young one, the lion, it was a beautiful stand that he
made — one against so many — three did he slay outright,
and that one there '^and he pointed to a body that was
still moving a little — ' will die anon, for his head is cracked
across, and others of those who are bomid are hurt. It
was a gallant fight, and thou and he have made a friend of
me by it, for I love to see a well-fought fray. But tell
me, my son, the baboon — and now I think of it thy face,
too, is hairy, and altogether like a baboon's — how was it
that ye slew those with a hole in them ? — Ye made a noise,
they say, and slew them — they fell down on their faces at
the noise ? '

I explained to him as well as I could, but very shortly —
I was terribly wearied, and only persuaded to talk at all
through fear of offending one so powerful if I refused to do
so — what were the properties of gunpowder, and he instantly
suggested that I should illustrate what I said by operating
on the person of one of the prisoners. One, he said, never
would be counted, and it would not only be very interesting
to him, but would give me an opportunity of an instalment
of revenge. He was greatly astounded when I told him
that it was not our custom to avenge ourselves in cold
blood, and that we left vengeance to the law and a higher
power, of which he knew nothing. I added, however, that
when I recovered I would take him out shooting with us,
and he should kill an aiiimal for himself,- and at this he
was as pleased as a child at the promise of a new toy.

Just then Leo opened his eyes beneath the stimulus
of some brandy (of which we stiU had a little) that Job
had poured down his throat, and our conversation came to
an end.

After this we managed to get Leo, who was in a very

A LITTLE FOOT log

poor way indeed, and only half- conscious, safely off to bed,
supported by Job and that brave girl Ustane, to whom,
had I not been afraid she might resent it, I would certainly
have given a kiss for her splendid behaviour in saving my
dear boy's life at the risk of her own. But Ustane was not
the sort of young person with whom one would care to take
liberties unless one were perfectly certain that they would
not be misunderstood, so I repressed my inclinations.
Then, bruised and battered, but with a sense of safety in
my breast to which I had for some days been a stranger, I
crept off to my own little sepulchre, not forgetting before I
luid down in it to thank Providence from the bottom of my
heart that it was not a sepulchre indeed, as were it not for
a merciful combination of events that I can only attribute
to its protection, it would certainly have been for me that
night. Few men have been nearer their end and yet escaped
it than we were on that dreadful day.

I am a bad sleeper at the best of times, and my dreams
that night when at last I got to rest were not of the
pleasantest. The awful vision of poor Mahomed struggling
to escape the red-hot pot would haunt them, and then in
the background, as it were, a veiled form was always hover-
ing, which, from time to time, seemed to draw the coverings
from its body, revealing now the perfect shape of a lovely
blooming woman, and now again the white bones of a grin-
ning skeleton, and which, as it veiled and unveiled, uttered
the mysterious and apparently meaningless sentence : —

' That which is alive hath known death, and that
zvhich is dead yet can never die, for in the Circle of the
Spirit life is navght and death is r.a-ight. Yea, all things
live for ever, though at times they sleep and are forgotten.'

The morning came at last, but when it came I found
that I was too stiff and sore to rise. About seven Job
arrived, limping terribly, and with his face the colour of a
rotten apple, and told me that Leo had slept fairly, but
was very weak. Two hours afterwards Billali (Job called
him ' Billy-goat,' to which, indeed, his white beard gave
liim some resen^Liance, or more familiarly ' Billy ') came

no SHE

too, bearing a lamp in his hand, his towering form reachiiig
neaily to the roof of the httle chamber. I pretended to be
asleep, and through' the cracks of my eyelids watched his
sardonic but handsome old face. He fixed his hawk-like
eyes upon me, and stroked his glorioiis white beard, which^
by the way, would have been worth a hundred a year to
any London barber as an advertisement.

' Ah ! ' I heard him mutter (Billali had. a habit of
muttering to himself), ' he is ugly — ugly as the other is
beautiful — a very Baboon, it was a good name. But I
like the man. Strange now, at my age, that I should
like a man. What says the proverb — " Mistrust all men,
and slay him whom thou mistrustest overmuch ; and as for
women, flee from them, for they are evil, and in the end
will destroy thee." It is a good proverb, especially the
last part of it : I think it must have come down from the
ancients. Nevertheless I like this Baboon, and I wonder
where they taught him his tricks, and I trust that She will
not bewitch him. Poor Baboon ! he must be wearied after
that fight.' I will go lest I should awake him.'

I waited till he had turned and was nearly through the
entrance, walking softly on tiptoe, and then I called after
him.

' My father,' I said, ' is it thou ? '

' Yes, my son, it is I ; but let me not disturb thee. I
did but come to see how thou didst fare, and to tell thee
that those who would have slain thee, my Baboon, are by
now well on their road to She. She said that ye also
were to come at once, but I fear ye cannot yet.'

'Nay,' I said, 'not till we have recovered a little ; but
have me borne out into the daylight, I pray thee, my
father. I love not this place.'

' Ah, no,' he answered, ' it hath a sad air. I remember
when I was a boy I found the body of a fair woman lying
where thou liest now, yes, oil that very-bench. She was so
beautiful that I was wont to creep in hither with a lamp and
gaze upon her^ Had it not been for her cold hands, almost
could I think that she slept and would ont day awake, so

A LITTLE FOOT in

fair and peaceful was she in her robes of white. White was
she, too, and her hair was yellow and lay down her ahnost
to the feet. There are many such stiU in the tombs at
the place where S/je is, for those who set them there had
a way I know naught of, whereby to keep their beloved out
of the crumbling hand of Decay, even when Death had slain
them. Ay, day by day I came hither, and gazed on her
till at last, laugh not at me, stranger, for I was but a silly
lad, I learned to love that dead form, that shell which once
had held a life that no more is. I would creep up to her
and kiss her cold face, and wonder how many men had
lived and died since she was, and who had loved her and
embraced her in the days that long had passed away. And,
my Baboon, I think I learned wisdom from that dead one,
for of a truth it taught me of the littleness of life, and the
length of Death, and how all things that are under the sun
go down one path, and are for ever forgotten. And so I
mused, and it seemed to me that wisdom flowed into me from
the dead, tiU one day my mother, a watchful woman, but
hasty-minded, seeing I was changed, followed me, and saw
the beautiful white one, and feared that I was bewitched,
as, indeed, I was. So half in dread, and half in anger, she
took the lamp, and standing the dead woman up against
the wall there, set fire to her hair, and she burnt fiercely,
even down to the feet, for those who are thus kept burn
excellently well.

' See, my son, there on the roof is yet the smoke of her
burning.'

I looked up doubtfuUy, and there, sure enough, on the
roof of the sepulchre, was a peculiarly unctuous and sooty
mark, three feet or more across. Doubtless it had in the
course of years been rubbed off the sides of the httle cave,
but on the roof it remained, and there was no mistaking its
appearance.

' She burnt,' he went on in a meditative way, ' even to
the feet, but the feet I came back and saved, cutting the
burnt bone from them,.and hid them under the stgne bench
there, wrapped up in a piece of linen. Surely, I remember

112 SHE

it as though it were but yesterday. Perchance they are
there if none have found them, even to this hour. Of a
truth I have not entered this chamber from that time to
this very day. Stay, I will look,' and, kneeling down, he
groped about with his long arm in the recess under the
stone bench. Presently his face brightened, and with an
exclamation he pulled something forth that was caked in
dust ; which he shook on to the floor. It was covered with
the remains of a rotting rag, which he undid, and revealed
to my astonished gaze a beautifully shaped and almost
white woman's foot, looking as fresh and as firm as though
it had but now been placed there.

' Thou seest, my son, the Baboon,' he said, in a sad
voice, ' I spake the truth to thee, for here is yet one foot
remaining. Take it, my son, and gaze upon it.'

I took this cold fragment of mortality in my hand and
looked at it in the light of the lamp with feelings which I
cannot describe, so mixed up were they between astonish-
ment, fear, and fascination. It was light, much hghter I
should say than it had been in the living state, and the
flesh to all appearance was still flesh, though about it there
clung a faintly aromatic odour. For the rest it was not
shrunk or shrivelled, or even black and unsightly, like the
flesh of Egyptian mummies, but plump and fair, and,
except where it had been slightly burnt, perfect as on the
day of death — a very triumph of embalming.

Poor little foot ! I set it down upon the stone bench
where it had lain for so many thousand years, and won-
dered whose was the beauty that it had upborne through
the pomp and pageantry of a forgotten civilisation — first
as a merry child's, then as a blushing maid's, and lastly as
a perfect woman's. Through what halls of Life had its
soft step echoed, and in the end, with what courage had
it trodden down the dusty ways of Death ! To whose side
had it stolen in' the hush of night when- the black slave
slept upon the marble floor, and who had listened for its
stealing ? Sha,pely littlfl foot ! Well might it have been
set upon the proud neck of a conqueror bent at last to

A LITTLE FOOT 113

woman's beauty, and well might the lips of nobles and of
kings have been pressed upon its jewelled whiteness.

I wrapped up this reHc of the past in the remnants
of the old linen rag which had evidently formed a portion
of its owner's grave-clothes, for it was partially burnt, and
put it away in my Gladstone bag, which I had bought at
the Army and Navy Stores — a strange combination, I
thought. Then with Billali's help I staggered off to see
Leo. I found him dreadfully bruised, worse even than
myself, perhaps owing to the excessive whiteness of his
skin, and faint and weak with the loss of blood from the
flesh wound in his side, but for aU that cheerful as a cricket,
and asking for some breakfast. Job and Ustane got him
on to the bottom, or rather the sacking of a htter, which
was removed from its pole for that purpose, and with the
aid, of old BillaU carried him out into the shade at the
rnouth of the cave, from which, by the way, every trace of
the slaughter of the previous night had now been removed,
aind there we aU breakfasted, and indeed spent that day,
and most of the two following ones.

On the third morning Job and myself were practically
recovered. Leo also was so much better that I yielded to
Billali's often expressed entreaty, and agreed to start at
once upon our journey to Kor, which we were told was the
name of the place where the mysterious She lived, though
I still feared for its effects upon Leo, and especially lest
the motion should cause his wound, which was scarcely
skinned over, to break open again. Indeed, had it not
been for Billah's evident anxiety to get off, which led us to
suspect that some difficulty or danger might threaten us if
we did not comply with it, I would not have consented
to go.

114 SHE

X.

SPECULATIONS.

Within an hour of our finally deciding to start five litters
were brought up to the door of the cave, each accompanied
by four regular bearers and two spare hands, also a band
of about fifty armed Amahagger, who were to form the
escort and carry the baggage. Three of these Utters, of
course, were for us, and one for BillaU, who, I was im-
menselyTeheved to hear, was to be our compaiiion, while
the fifth I presumed was for the use of Ustane.

'Does the lady go with us, my father?' I asked of
Billali, as he stood superintending tilings generally,
■ He shrugged his shoulders as he answered —

' If she wills. In this country the women do what
they please. We worship them, and give them their way,
because mthout them the world could not go on ; they are
the source of life.'

' Ah,' I said, the matter never having struck me quite in
that light before.

' We worship them,' he went on, 'up to a certain point,
till at last they get unbearable, which,' he added, ' they do.
about every second generation.'

' And then what do you do ? ' I asked, with curiosity.

' Then,' he answered, with a faint smile, ' we rise, and
kill the old ones as an example to the young ones, and to
show them that we are the strongest. My poor wife was
Idlled in that way three years ago. It was very sad, but
to tell thee the truth, my son, life has been happier since,
for my age protects me from the young ones.'

' In short,' I replied, quoting the saying of a great man
whose wisdom has not yet lightened the darkness of the

SPEC ULA TIONS 1 1 S

Amaliagger, ' thou liast found thy position one of greater
freedom and less responsibiHty.'

This phrase puzzled him a little at first from its vague-
ness, though I think my translation hit off its sense very
weU, but at last he saw it, and appreciated it.

' Yes, yes, my Baboon,' he said, ' I see it now, but all
the " responsibilities " are Idlled, at least some of them
are, and that is why there are so few old women about just
now. Well, they brought it on themselves. As for this
girl,' he went on, in a graver tone, ' I know not what to
say. She is a brave girl, and she loves the Lion (Leo) ;
thou sawest how she clung to him, and saved his Hfe.
Also, she is, according to our custom, wed to him, and
has a right to go where he goes, vmless,' he added sig-
nificantly, ' She would say her no, for her word overrides
all-rights.'

' And if She bade her leave him, and the girl refused ?
What then ? '

' If,"" he said, with a shrug, ' the hurricane bids the tree
to bend, and it will not ; what happens ? '

And then, without waiting for an answer, he turned
and walked to his litter, and in ten minutes from that time
we were all weU under weigh.

It took us an hour and more to cross the cup of the
volcanic plain, and another half-hour or so to climb the
edge on the farther side. Once there, however, the view was
a very fine one. Before us was a long steep slope of grassy
plain, broken here and there by clumps of trees mostly of
the thorn tribe. At the bottom of this gentle slope, some
nine or ten miles away, we could make out a dim sea of
marsh, over which the foul vapours hung like smoke about
a city. It was easy going for the bearers down the slopes,
and by midday we had reached the borders of the dismal
swamp. Here we halted to eat our midday meal, and
then, following a winding and devious path, plunged into
the morass. Presently the path, at any rate to our un-
accustomed eyes, grew so faint as to be almost indistin-
guishable from those made by the aquatic beasts and birds,

I 2

Ii6 SHE

and it is to this day a mystery to me how our bearers found
their way across the marshes. Ahead of the cavalcade
marched two men with long poles, which they now and
again plunged into the ground before them, the reason of
this being that the nature of the soil frequently changed
from causes with which I am not acquainted, so that
places which might be safe enough to cross one month would
certainly swallow the wayfarer the next. Never did I see
a more dreary and depressing scene. Miles on miles of
quagmire, varied only by bright green strips of compara-
tively sohd ground, and by deep and sullen pools fringed
with taU rushes, in which the bitterns boomed and the frogs
croaked incessantly : miles on miles of it without a break,
unless the fever fog can be called a break. The only life
in this great morass was that of the aquatic birds, and the
animals that fed on them, of both of which there were
v&,st numbers. Geese, cranes, ducks, teal, coot, snipe, and
plover swarmed all around us, many being of varieties that
were quite new to me, and all so tame that one could almost
have knocked them over with a stick. Aniong these birds
I especially noticed a very beautiful variety of painted snipe,
almost the size of woodcock, and with a flight more re-
sembling that bird's than an English snipe's. In the
pools, too, was a species of small alligator or enormous
iguana, I do not know which, that fed, BillaU told me,
upon the waterfowl, also large quantities of a hideous black
water-snake, of which the bite is very dangerous, though not,
I gathered, so deadly as a cobra's or a puif adder's. The
DuU-frogs were also very large, and with voices propor-
tionate to their size ; and as for the mosquitoes — the ' mus-
queteers,' as Job called them — they were, if possible, even
worse than they had been on the river, and tormented us
greatly. Undoubtedly, however, the worst feature of the
swamp was the awful smell of rotting vegetation that hung
about it, which was at times positively overpowering, and
the malarious exhalations that accompanied it, which we
were of course obliged to breathe.

On we went through it all, till at last the sun sank in

SPECULA TIONS 1 1 7

sullen splendour just as we reached a spot of rising ground
about two acres in extent— a little oasis of dry in the midst
of the miry wilderness — where Billali announced that we
were to camp. The camping, however, turned out to be a
very simple process, and consisted, in fact, in sitting down
on the ground round a scanty fire made of dry reeds and
some wood that had been brought with us. However, we
made the best we could of it, and smoked and ate with
such appetite as the smell of damp, stifling heat would
allow, for it was very hot on this low land, and yet, oddly
enough, chilly at times. But, however hot it was, we were
glad enough to keep near the fire, because we found that
the mosquitoes did not like the smoke. Presently we rolled
ourselves up in our blankets and tried to go to s eep, but
so far as I was concerned the bull-frogs, and the extra-
ordinary roaring and alarming sound produced by hundreds
of snipe hovering high in the air, made sleep an impossi-
bility, to say nothing of our other discomforts. I turned
and looked at Leo, who was next me ; he was dozing, but
his face had a flushed appearance that I did not like, and
by the flickering fire-light I saw Ustane, who was lying
on the other side of him, raise herself fi-om time to time
upon her elbow, and look at him anxiously enough.

However, I could do nothing for him, for we had all
already taken a good dose of quinine, which was the only
preventive we had ; so I lay and watched the stars come
out by thousands, tUl all the immense arch of heaven was
sewn with glittering points, and every point a world !
Here was a glorious sight by which man might weU
measure his own insignificance ! Soon I gave up thinking
about it, for the mind wearies easily when it strives to
grapple with the Infinite, and to trace the footsteps of the
Almighty as he strides from sphere to sphere, or deduce
His jjurpose from His works. Such things are not for us
to know. Knowledge is to the strong, and we are weak. Too
much wisdom would perchance blind om* imperfect sight,
and too much strength would make us drunk, and over-
weight our feeble reason till it fell, and we were drowned

ii8 SHE

in tlie deptlis of our own vanity. For what is the first result
of man's increased knowledge interpreted from Nature's
book by the persistent eJBfort of his purblind observation ?
Is it not but too often to make him question the existence
of his Maker, or indeed of any intelHgent purpose beyond
his own ? The truth is veiled, because we could no more
look upon her glory than we can upon the sun. It would
destroy us. FuU knowledge is not for man as man is here,
for his capacities, which he is apt to think so great, are
indeed but small. The vessel is soon fiUed, and, were
one-thousandth part of the unutterable and silent wisdom
that directs the rolling of those shining spheres, and the
force which makes them roll, pressed into it, it would be
shattered into fragments. Perhaps in some other place
and time it may be otherwise, who can tell ? Here the lot
of man bom of the flesh is but to endure midst toil and
tribulation, to catch at the bubbles blown by Fate, which
he calls pleasures, thankful if before they biu:st they rest a
moment in his hand, and when the tragedy is played out,
and his hour comes to perish, to pass humbly whither he
knows not.

Above me, as I lay, shone the eternal stars, and there
at my feet the impish marsh-bom balls of fire roUed this
way and that, vapour-tossed and earth-desiring, and me-
thought that in the two I saw a type and image of what
man is, and what perchance man may one day be, if the
living Force who ordained him and them should so
ordain this also. Oh, that it might be ours to rest year by
year upon that high level ' of the heart to which at times
we momentarily attam ! Oh, that we could shake loose
the prisoned pinions of the soul and soar to that superior
point, whence, like to some traveller looking out through
space from Darien's giddiest peak, we might gaze with
the spu-itual eyes of noble thoughts deep into Infinity !

"What would it be to cast off this earthy robe, to have
done for ever with these earthy thoughts and miserable
desires ; ho longer, like those corpse candles, to be tossed
this way and that, by forces beyond our control ; or which,

SPECULATIONS 119

if we can theoretically control tliem, we are at times driven
by the exigencies of our nature to obey ! Yes, to cast them
oflf, to have done with the foul and thorny places of the world;
and, like to those ghttering points above me, to rest on high
wrapped for ever in the brightness of our better selves, that
even now shines in us as fire faintly shines within those
lurid balls, and lay down our littleness in that wide glory
of our dreams, that invisible but surrounding good, from
which all truth and beauty comes !

These and many such thoughts passed through my
mind that night. They come to torment us all at times.
I say to torment, for, alas ! thinking can only serve to
measure out the helplessness of thought. What is the
use of our feeble crying in the awful silences of space ?
Can our dim intelligence read the secrets of that star-
strewn sky ? Does any answer come out of it ? Never
any at all, nothing but echoes and fantastic visions. And
yet we believe that there is an answer, and that upon a
time a new Dawn will come blushing down the ways of
our enduring night. We believe it, for its reflected beauty
even now shines up continually in our hearts from beneath
the horizon of the grave, and we call it Hope. Without
Hope we should suffer moral death, and by the help of
Hope we yet may climb to Heaven, or at the worst, if
she also prove but a kindly mockery given to hold us
from despair, be gently lowered into the abysses of eternal
sleep.

Then I fell to reflecting upon the undertakmg on
which we were bent, and what a wild one it was, and yet
how strangely tlie story seemed to fit in with what had
boon written centuries ago upon the sherd. Who was this
extraordinary woman, Queen over a people apparently as
extraordinary as herself, and reigning amidst the vestiges
of a lost civilisation ? And what was the meaning of this
story of the Fire that gave unending Ufe ? Could it be
possible that any fluid or essence should exist which might
so fortify tliese fleshy walls that they should from age to
a^e resist tlic mines and batterings of decay ? It was

120 ^ SHE

possible, though not probable. The indefinite continuation
of life would not, as poor Vincey said, be so marvellous a
thing as the production of life and its temporary endurance.
And if it were true, what then ? The person who found it
could no doubt rule the world. He could accumulate all
the wealth in the world, and all the power, and all the
wisdom that is power. He might give a lifetime to the
study of each art or science. "Well, if that were so, and this
She were practically immortal, which I did not for one
moment beheve, how was it that, with all these things at
her feet, she preferred to remain in a cave amongst a
society of cannibals ? This surely settled the question.
The whole story was monstrous, and only worthy of the
superstitious days in which it was written. At any rate I
was very sure that I would not attempt to attain miending
life. I had had far too many worries and disappointments
and secret bitternesses during my forty odd years of exist-
ence to wish that this state of affairs should be continued
indefinitely. And yet I suppose that my life has been,
comparatively speaking, a happy one.

And then, reflecting that at the present moment there
was far more likelihood of our earthly careers being cut
exceedingly short than of their bemg unduly prolonged, I
at last managed to get to sleep, a fact for which anybody
who reads this narrative, if anybody ever does, may very
probably be thankful.

When I woke again it was just dawning, and the guard
and bearers were moving about like ghosts through the
dense morning mists, getting ready for our start. The
fire had died quite down, and I rose and stretched myself,
shivering in every limb from the damp cold of the dawn.
Then I looked at Leo. He was sitting up, holding his
hands to his head, and I saw that his face was flushed and
his eye bright, and yet yeUow round the pupil.

' Well, Leo,' I said, ' how do you feel ? '

'I feel as though I were going to die,' he answered
hoarsely. ' My head is splitting, my body is trembling,
and I am as sick ^.s a cat,'

SPECULA TIONS 1 2 1

I ■whistled, or if I did not wliistle I felt inclined to —
Leo had got a sharp attack of fever. I went to Job, and
asked him for the quinine^ of which fortunately we had
stUl a good supply, only to find that Job himself was not
much better. He complained of pains across the back,
and dizziness, and was almost incapable of helping him-
self. Then I did the only thing it was possible to do under
the circumstances— gave them both about ten grains of
quinine, and took a slightly smaller dose myself as a
matter of precaution. After that I found BUlali, and
explained to him how matters stood, asking at the same
time what he thought had best be done. He came with
me, and looked at Leo and Job (whom, by the way, he had
named the Pig on account of his fatness, round face, and
small eyes).

• Ah,' he said, when we were out of earshot, ' the fever !
I thought so. The Lion has it badly, but he is young,
and he may live. As for the Pig, his attack is not so bad ;
it is the " little fever " which he has ; that always begins
with pains across the back, it will spend itself upon his
fat.'

' Can they go on, my father ? ' I asked.

' Nay, my son, they must go on. If they stop here they
will certainly die ; also, they will be better in the litters
than on the ground. By to-night, if all goes well, we
shall be across the marsh and in good air. Come, let us
lift them into the litters and start, for it is very bad to
stand stm in this morning fog. We can eat our meal as
we go.'

This we accordingly did, and with a heavy heart I
once more set out upon our strange journey. For the first
three hours all went as well as could be expected, and
then an accident happened that nearly lost us' the pleasure
of the company of our venerable friend BUlali, whose
litter was leading the cavalcade. "We were going through
a particularly dangerous stretch of quagmire, in which the
bearers sometimes sank up to their knees. Indeed, it was
a mystery to me how they contrived to carry the heavy

122 SHE -

litters at all over such ground as that which we were
traversing, though the two spare hands, as well as the
four regular ones, had of course to put their shoulders to
the pole.

Presently, as we blundered and floundered along, there
was a sharp cry, then a storm of exclamations, and, last
of aU, a most tremendous splash, and the whole caravan
halted.

I jumped out of my litter and ran forward. About
twenty yards ahead was the edge of one of those suUen
peaty pools of which I have spokenj the path we were
following runnmg along the top of its bank, that, as it
happened, was a steep one. Looking towards this pool,
to my horror I saw that Billah's htter was floating on it,
and as for BillaH himself, he was nowhere to be seen. To
make matters clear I may as well explain at once what
had happened. One of Billali's bearers had unfortunately
trodden on a basking snake, which had bitten him in the
leg, whereon he had, not unnaturally, let go of the pole, and
then, finding that he was tumbling down the bank, grasped
at the litter to save himself. The result of this was what
might have been expected. The litter was pulled over the
edge of the bank, the bearers let go, and the whole thing,
including IBillali and the man who had been bitten, rolled
into the slimy pool. When I got to the edge of the water
neither of them were to be seen, and, indeed, the unfor-
tunate bearer never was seen again. Either he struck his
head against something, or got wedged in the mud, or
possibly the snake-bite paralysed him. At any rate, ho
vanished. But though Billali was not to be seen, his
whereabouts was clear enough from the agitation of the
floating litter, in the bearing cloth and curtains of which
he was entangled.

' He is there ! Our father is there ! ' said one of the
men, but he did not stir a finger to help him, nor did any
of the others. They simply stood and stared at the water.

' Out of the way, you brutes,' I shouted in English,
and throwing off my hat I took a run and sprang well

SPECULATIONS. 123

out into the horrid slimy-looking pool. A couple of strokes
took me to where Billali was struggling beneath the cloth.

Somehow, I do not quite know how, I managed to push
this free of him, and his venerable head all covered with
green shme, like that of a yellowish Bacchus with ivy
leaves, emerged upon the surface of the water. The rest
was easy, for BillaU was an eminently practical individual,
and had the common sense not to grasp hold of me as
drowning people often do, so I got him by the arm, and
towed him to the bank, through the mud of which we were
with difficulty dragged. Such a filthy spectacle as we
presented I have never seen before or since, and it will
perhaps give some idea of the almost superhuman dignity
of BillaU's appearance when I say that, coughing, half-
drowned, and covered with mud and green slime as he was,
with his beautiful beard coming to a dripping point, hke
a Chinaman's freshly oiled pigtail, he stiU looked venerable
and imposing.

'Ye dogs,' he said, addressing the bearers, as soon as
he had sufficiently recovered to speak, ' ye left me, your
father, to drown. Had it not been for this stranger, my
son the Baboon, assuredly I should have drowned. Well,
I will remember it,' and he fixed them with his gleaming
though shghtly watery eye, in a way I saw they did not
like, though they tried to appear suUdly mdifferent.

' As for thee, my son,' the old man went on, turning
towards me and graspuig my hand, ' rest assured that I
am thy friend through good and evil. Thou hast saved
my Hfe :' perchance a day may come when I shall save
thine.'

After that we cleaned ourselves as best wo could, fished
out the litter, and went on, minus the man who. had been
drowned. I do not Imow if it was owing to his bemg an
unpopular character, or from native indifference and selfish-
ness of temperament, but I am bound to say that nobody
seemed to grieve much over his sudden and final disap-
pearance, unless, perhaps, it was the men who had to do
his share of the work.

124 SHE

XI.

TUE PLAIN OF K^B.

About an Lour before sundown we at last, to my un-
bounded gratitude, emerged from the great belt of marsh
on to land that swelled upwards in a succession of roUinp;
waves. Just on the hither side of the crest of the first
wave we halted for the night. My first act was to examme
Leo's condition. It was, if anything, worse than in the
morning, and a new and very distressing feature, vomiting,
set in, and continued till dawn. Not one wink of sleep did
I get that night, for I passed it. in assisting Ustane, who
was one of the most gentle and indefatigable nurses I ever
saw, to wait upon Leo and Job. However, the air here
was warm and genial without being too hot, and there
were no mosquitoes to speak of. Also we were above the
level of the marsh mist, which lay stretched beneath us
like the dim smoke-paU over a city, lit up here and there
by the wandering globes of fen fire. Thus it will be seen
that we were, speaking comparatively, in clover.

By dawn on the following morning Leo was quite light-
headed, and fancied that he was divided into halves. I
was dreadfully distressed, and began to wonder with a sort
of sick fear what the termmation of the attack would be.
Alas ! I had heard but too much of how these attacks
generally terminate. As I was doing so Billali came up
and said that we must be getting on, more especially as,
in his opinion, if Leo did not reach some spot where he
could be quiet, and have proper nursing, within the next
twelve hours, his life would only be a matter of a day or
two. I could not but agree with him, so we got him into
the litter, and started on, Ustane walking by Leo's side to

THE PLAIN OF k6R 125

keep the flies off bim, and see tliat he did not throw him-
self out on to the ground.

Within half an hour of sunrise we had reached the top
of the rise of which I have spoken, and a most beautiful
view broke upon our gaze. Beneath us was a rich stretch
of country, verdant with grass and lovely with foUage and
flowers. In the background, at a distance, so far as I could
judge, of some eighteen miles from where we then stood, a
huge and extraordinary mountain rose abruptly from the
plain. The base of this great mountain appeared to consist
of a grassy slope, but rising from this, I should say, from
subsequent observation, at a height of about five himdred
feet above the level of the plain, was a most tremendous
and absolutely precipitous wall of bare rock, quite twelve
or fifteen hundred feet in height. The shape of the
mountain, which was undoubtedly of volcanic origin, was
round, and of course, as only a segment of its circle was
visible, it was difficult to estimate its exact size, which was
enormous. I afterwards discovered that it could not cover
less than fifty square miles of ground. Anything more
grand and imposing than the sight presented by this great
natural castle, starting in solitary grandeur from the level
of the plain, I never saw, and I suppose I never shall. Its
very solitude added to its majesty, and its towering cliffs
seemed to kiss the sky. Indeed, generally speaking, they
were clothed in clouds that lay in fleecy masses upon their
broad and level battlements.

I sat up in my hammock and gazed out across the plain
at this thrilling and majestic sight, and I suppose that
Billali noticed it, for he brought lus litter alongside.

'Behold the House of " She-who-must-be-obeyed I " '
he said. ' Had ever a queen such a throne before ? '

' It is wonderful, my father,' I answered. ' But how
do we enter ? Those cliffs look hard to climb.'

' Thou shalt see, my Baboon. Look now at the plain
below us. "What thinkest thou that it is ? Thou art a
wise man. Come, tell me.'

I looked, and saw what appeared to be the line of road-

126 SHE

way running straight towards tlie base of the mountain,
though it was covered with turf. There were high banks
on each side of it, broken here and there, but fairly con-
tinuous on the whole, the meaning of which I did not
understand. It seemed so very odd that anybody should
embank a roadway.

' Well, my father,' I answered, ' I suppose that it is a
road, otherwise I should have been inclined to say that it
was the bed of a river, or rather,' I added, observing the
extraordinary directness of the cutting, ' of a canal.'

Billali — who, by the way, was none the worse for his
immersion of the day before — nodded his head sagely as
he replied—

' Thou art right, my son. It is a channel cut out by
those who were before us in this place to carry away water.
Of this am I sure : within the rocky circle of the great
mountain whither we journey was once a great lake. But
those who were before us, by wonderful arts of which I
know naught, hewed a path for the water through the solid
rock of the mountain, piercing even to the bed of the lake.
But first they cut the channel that" thou seest across the
plain. Then, when at last the water burst out, it rushed
down the channel that had been made to receive it, and
crossed this plain till it reached the low land behind the
rise, and there, perchance, it made the swamp through
which we had come. Then when the lake was drained
dry, the people whereof I speak built a mighty city, where-
of naught but ruins and the name of K6r yet remaineth, on
its bed, and from age to age hewed the caves and passages
that thou wilt see.'

' It may be,' I answered ; ' but if so, how is it that the
lake does not fill up again with the rains and the water of
the springs ? '

' Nay, my son, the people were a wise people, and they
left a drain to keep it clear. Seest thou the river to the
right ? ' and he pointed to a fair-sized stream that wound
away across the plain, some four mUes from us. ' That is
the dram, and it comes out through the mountain wall

THE PLAIN OF K6R 127

where this cutting goes in. At first, perhaps, the water ran
down this canal, but afterwards the people turned it, and
used the cutting for a road.'

' And is there then no other place where one may
enter into the great mountain,' I asked, ' except through
the drain ? '

' There is a place,' he answered, 'where cattle and men
on foot may cross with much labour, but it is secret. A
year mightest thou search and shouldst never find it. It
is only used once a year, when the herds of cattle that have
been fattmg on the slopes of the mountain, and on tins
plain, are driven into the space within.'

• And does Ehe live there always ? ' I asked, ' or does
she come at times without the mountain ? '

' Nay, my son, where she is, there she is.'

By now we were well on to the great plain, and I was
examining with delight the varied beauty of its semi-tro-
pical flowers and trees, the latter of ■p^hicli grew singly, or
at most in clumps of three or four, much of the timber
being of large size, and belonging apparently to a, variety of
evergreen oak. There were also many palms, some of
them more than one hundred feet high, and the largest
and most beautiful tree ferns that I ever saw, about which
hung clouds of jewelled honeysuckers and great-winged
butterflies. Waiidering about among the trees or crouch-
ing in the long and feathered grass were all varieties of
game, from rhinoceroses down. I saw rhinoceros, buffalo
(a large herd), eland, quagga, and sable antelope, the most
beautiful of all the bucks, not to mention many smaller
varieties of game, and three ostriches which scudded away
at our approach like white drift before a gale. So plenti-
ful was the game that at last I could stand it no longer.
I had a single-barrel sporting Martini with me in the litter,
the ' Express ' being too cumbersome, and espying a beau-
tiful fat eland rubbing liimseK under one of the oak-like
trees, I jumped out of the litter, and proceeded to creep as
near to him as I could. He let me come within eighty
yards, and then turned his head, and stared at me, pre-

128 SHE

paratory to running away. I lifted tlie rifle, and taking
him about midway down the shoulder, for he was side on
to me, fired. I never made a cleaner shot or a better kill
in all my small experience, for the great buck sprang right
up into the air and fell dead. The bearers, who had all
halted to see the performance, gave a murmur of surprise,
an unwont^ compliment from these sullen people, who
never appear to be surprised at anything, and a party of
the guard at once ran off to cut the animal up. As for
myself, though I was longing tb have a look at him, I
sauntered back to my litter as though I had been in the
habit of killing eland all my life, feeling that I had gone
up several degrees in the estimation of the Amahagger,
who looked on the whole thing as a very high-class mani-
festation of witchcraft. As a matter of fact, however, I
had never seen an eland in a wild state before. Billali
received me with enthusiasm.

' It is wonderful, my son the Baboon,' he cried ; ' won-
derful ! Thou art a very great man, though so ugly. Had
I not seen, surely I would never have beUeved. And thou
sayest that thou wilt teach me to slay in this fashion ? '

' Certauily, my father,' I said airily ; ' it is nothing.'

But all the same I firmly made up my mind that when
' my father ' Billali began to fire I would without fail lie
down or take refuge behind a tree.

After this little incident nothing happened of any note
tin about an hour and a half before sundown, when we
arrived beneath the shadow of the towering volcanic mass
that I have already described. It is quite impossible for
me to describe ;ts grim g randepr-as it appeared to me while
my patient bearers toiled along the bed of the ancient
watercourse towards the spot where the rich brown-clad
cliff shot up fi:om precipice to precipice till its crown lost
itself in cloud. All I can say is that it almost awed me by
the intensity of its lonesome and most solemn greatness.
On we went up the bright and sunny slope, till at last the
creeping shadows from above swallowed up its brightness,
and presently we began to pass through a cutting hewn in

THE PLAIN OF KOR 129

tlio living rock. Deeper and deeper grew this marvellons
work, which must, I should say, have employed thousands
of men for many years. Indeed how it was ever executed
at all without the aid of blasting-powder or dynamite I
cannot to this day imagine. It is and must remain one of
the mysteries of that wild land. I can only suppose that
these cuttings and the vast caves that had been hoUowed
out of the rocks they pierced were the State undertakings
of the people of Kor, who lived here in the dim lost ages of
the world, and, as in the ease of the Egyptian monuments,
were executed by the forced labour of tens of thousands of
captives, carried on through an indefinite number of cen-
turies. But who were the people ?

At last we reached the face of the precipice itself, and
found ourselves looking into the mouth of a dark tunnel
that forcibly remmded me of those undertaken by our
nineteenth-century engineers in the construction of rail-
way lines. Out of this tunnel flowed a considerable stream
of water. Indeed, though I do not think that I have
mentioned it, we had followed this stream, which ulti-
mately developed into the river I have already described as
winding away to the right, from the spot where the cxitting
in the solid rock commenced. Half of this cutting formed
a channel for the stream, and half, which was placed on a
slightly higher level — eight foot perhaps — was devoted to
the purposes of a roadway. At the termination of the
cutting, however, the stream turned off across the plain
and followed a channel of its own. At the mouth of the
cave the cavalcade was halted, and, while the men employed
themselves in lighting some earthenwaxe lamps they had
brought with them, Billali, descending from his litter,
informed me politely but firmly that the orders of She-
Vv'ere that we were now to Ijg blindfolded, so that wo
should not learn the seci'ct of the paths through the bowels
of the mountains. To this I, of course, assented cheerfully
enough, but Job, who was now very much better, notwith-
standing the journey, did not like it at all, fancying, I
believe, that it was but a preliminary step to being liot-

K

I30 SHE

potted. He was, however, a littlo consoled wlien I pointed
out to him that there wore no hot pots at hand, and, so far
as I Iniew, no fire to heat them in. As for poor Leo, after
turning restlessly for hours, he had, to my deep thanldul-
ness, at last dropped off into a sleep or stupor, I do not know
which, BO there was no need to blindfold him. The blind-
folding was performed by binding a piece of the yellowish
linen whereof those of the Amahagger who condescended
to wear anything in particular made their dresses tightly
round the eyes. This linen I afterwards discovered was
taken from the tombs, and was not, as I had at first
supposed, of native manufacture. The bandage was then
knotted at the back of the head, and finally brought down
again and the ends bound under the chin to prevent its
slipping. Ustane was, by the way, also bUndfolded, I do
not know why, unless it was from fear that she should
impart the secrets of the route to us.

This operation performed we started on once more, and
soon, by the echoing sound of the footsteps of the bearers
and the increased noise of the water caused by reverbera-
tion in a confined space, I knew that we were entering
into the bowels of the great mountain. It was an eerie
sensation, being borne along into the dead heart of the
rock we laiew not whither, but I was getting used to eerie
sensations by this time, and by now was pretty well pre-
pared for anything. So I lay still, and Hstened to the
tramp, tramp of the bearers and the rushing of the water,
and tried to believe that I was enjoying myself. Presently
the men set up the melancholy little chant that I had heard
on the first night when we were captured in the whale-
boat, and the effect produced by their voices was very
curious, and quite indescribable on paper. After a while
the air began to get exceedingly thick and heavy, so much
so, indeed, that I felt as though I were going to choke,
tiU at length the litter took a sharp turn, then another and
another, and the sound of the running water ceased. After
this the air got fresher again, but the turns were con-
tinuous, and to me, blindfolded as I was, most bewildering.

THE PLAIN OF k6r 131

I ti'ied to keep a map of tliem in my mind in eaae it miglit
ever be necessary for us to try and escape by this route,
but, needless to say, failed utterly. Another lialf-liour or
so passed, and then suddenly I became aware that we wero
once more in the open air. I could see the light through
my bandage and feel its freshness on my face. A few
more minutes and the caravan halted, and I heard Billali
order Ustane to remove her bandage and undo ours.
Without waiting for her attentions I got the l:not of mine
loose, and looked out.

As I anticipated, we had passed right through tho
precipice, and were now on the farther side, and imme-
diately beneath its beetling face. The first thing I noticed
v.'as that the cliff was not nearly so high here, not so
high I should say by five hmidred feet, which proved that
the bed of the lake, or rather of the vast ancient crater in
which we stood, was much above the level of the surround-
ing plain. For the rest, we fomid ourselves in a huge rock-
surrounded cup, not unlike that of the first place Vv'herG
we had sojourned, only ten times the size. Indeed, I
could only just malie out the frowning line of the opposite
cliffs. A great portion of the plain thus enclosed by
nature was cultivated, and fenced in with walls of stono
placed there to keep the cattle and goats, of w Inch there
were large herds about, from breaking into the gardens.
Here and there rose great grass mounds, and some miles
away towards the centre I thought that I could see the
outline of colossal ruins. I had no time to observe any-
thing more at the moment, for we were instantly surrounded
by crowds of Amahagger, similar in every particular to those
with whom we were already familiar, who, though they
spoke little, pressed round us so closely as to obscure the
view to a person lying in a hammock. Then all of a
sudden a number of armed men arranged in companies,
and marshalled by officers who held ivory wands in their
hands, came running swiftly towards us, having, so far
as I could make out, emerged from the face of the pre-
cipice like ants from their burrows. These men as well

£ 2

132 SHE

as their officers were all robed in addition to tlie usual
leopard skin, and, as I gathered, formed the bodyguard of
Shs herself.

Their leader advanced to Billali, saluted him by placing
his ivory wand transversely across his forehead, and then
asked some question which I could not catch, and BiUali
having answered him the whole regiment turned and
marched along the side of the cliff, our cavalcade of litters
following in their track. After going thus for about halj
a mile we halted once more in front of the mouth of a
tremendous cave, measuring about sixty feet in height by
eighty wide, and here Billali descended finally, and re-
quested Job and myself to do the same. Leo, of course,
was far too ill to do anything of the sort. I did so, and
we entered the great cave, into which the light of the setting
sun penetrated for some distance, while beyond the reach
of the light it was faintly illuminated with lamps which
seemed to me to stretch away for an almost immeasurable
distance, like the gas lights of an empty London street.
The first thmg that I noticed was that the walls were
covered with sculptures in bas-relief, of a sort, pictorially
speaking, similar to those that I have described upon the
vases ; — love-scenes principally, then hunting pictures,
pictures of executions, and the torture of criminals by
the placing of a presumably red-hot pot upon the licad,
showing whence our hosts had derived this pleasant
practice. There were very few battle-pieces, though many
of duels, and men running and wrestling, and from this
fact I am led to believe that this people was not much
subject to attack by exterior foes, either on account of tlie
isolation of' their position or because of their great
strength. Between the pictures were columns of stone
characters of a formation absolutely new to me ; at any
rate they were neither Greek nor Egyptian, nor Hebrew,
nor Assyrian — that I am sure of. They looked more like
Chinese writings than any other that I am acquainted
with. Near to the entrance of the cave both pictures and
writings were worn away, but further in they were in many

THE PLAIN OF KUR 133

cases absolutely fresh and perfect as the day on which the
sculptor had ceased work upon them.

The regiment of guards did not come further than the
entrance to the cave, where they formed up to let us pass
throtigh. On entering the place itself we were, however,
met by a man robed in white, who bowed humbly, but said
nothing, which, as it afterwards appeared that he was a
deaf mute, was not very wonderful.

Eunning at right angles to the great cave, at a distance
of some twenty feet from the entrance was a smaller, cave
or wide gallery, that was pierced into the rook both to the
right and to the left of the main cavern. In front of the
gallery to our left stood two guards, from which circum-
stance I argued that it was the entrance to the apartments
of S/ie herself. The mouth of the right-hand gallery was
unguarded, and along it the mute indicated that we were
to proceed. Walking a few yards down this passage,
which was lighted with lamps, we came to the entrance to
a chamber having a curtain made of some grass material,
not unlike a Zanzibar mat, in appearance, hmig over the
doorway. Tliis the mute drew back with another profound
obeisance, and led the way into a good-sized apartment,
hewn, of course, out of the solid rock, but to my great
delight lighted by means of a shaft pierced in the face of
the precipice. In this room was a stone bedstead, pots full
of water for washing, and beautifully tanned leopard skms
to serve as blankets.

Here we left Leo, who was still sleeping heavily, and
with him stopped IlLtanc. I noticed that the mute gave
her a very sharp look, as much as to say, ' Who are you,
and by whose orders do you come here ? ' Then he con-
ducted us to another similar room which Job took, and
then to two more that were respectively occupied by BiUali
and myself.

134 SHE

XII.

' SHE.'

The first care of Job and myself, after seeing to Leo,
was to wash ourselves and put on clean clothing, for Vvhat
wo were wearing had not been changed since the loss of
the dhow. Fortunately, as I think that I have said, by
f;ir the greater part of our personal baggage had been
packed into the whale-boat, and was therefore saved— and
brought hither by the bearers — although all the stores laid
in by us for barter and presents to the natives were lost.
Kcarly all our clothing was made of a well-shrunk and
very strong grey flannel, and excellent I found it for
travelling in these places, because though a Norfolk jacket,
shirt, and pair of trousers of it only weighed about four
pounds, a great consideration in a tropical country, where
every extra ounce tells on the wearer, it was warm, and
offered a good resistance to the rays of the sun, and best of
all to chills, which are so apt to result from sudden changes
of temperature.

Never shall I forget the comfort of the ' wasli and
bruKli-up,' and of those clean flannels. The only thing
that was wanting to complete my joy was a cake of sdip,
of which we had none.

Afterwards I discovered that the Amahagger, who do
not reckon dirt among their many disagreeable qualities,
use a kind of burnt earth for washing purposes, which,
though unpleasant to the touch till one gets accustomed to
it, forms a very fair substitute for soap.

By the time that I was dressed, and had combed and
trimmed my black beard, the previous condition of which
was certainly sufllcienllyunkcnrot to give vroight toBillali's

'SITE' 135

appellation for me, the ' Baboon,' I began to feel most mi-
commonly hungry. Therefore I was by no means sorry
v.'hen, without the slightest preparatory sound or warning,
the curtain over the entrance to my cave was flung aside,
and another mute, a yomig girl this time, announced to me
by signs that I could not mismiderstand — that is, by open-
ing her mouth and pointing down it— that there was some-
thing ready to eat. Accordmgly I followed her into the
next chamber, which we had not yet entered, where I found
Job, who had also, to his great embarrassment, been con-
ducted thither by a fair mute. Job had never got over the
advances the former lady had made towards him, and sus-
pected every girl who came near to him of similar designs.

' These young parties have a way of looking at one,
sir,' lie would say apologetically, ' which I don't call
respectable.'

This chamber was twice the size of the sleeping caves,
and I saw at once that it had originally served as a re-
fectory, and also probably as an embalming room for the
Priests of the Dead ; for I may as well say at once that
these hollowed-out caves were notlimg more or less than
vast catacombs, in which for tens of ages the mortal
remains of the great extmct race whose monum.ents sur-
rounded us had been first preserved, with an art and a
completeness that has never since been equalled, and then
hidden away for all time. On each side of this particular
roclc-chamber was a long and solid stone table, about three
feet wide by three feet six in height, hewn out of the living
rock, of which it had formed part, and was still attached
to at the base. These tables were slightly hollowed out
or curved inward, to give room for the knees of any one
sitting on the stone ledge that had been cut for a bench
along the side of the cave at a distance of about two feet
from them. Each of them, also, was so arranged that it
ended right under a shaft pierced in the rock for the
admission of light and air. On examining them carefully,
however, I saw that there was a difference between them
that had at first escaped my attention, viz. that one of the

136 SHE

tables, that to the left as we entered the cave, had evidently
Deen used, not to eat upon, but for the purposes of em-
Dalming. That this was beyond all question the case was
clear from five shallow depressions in the stone of the
table, all shaped like a human form, with a separate place
for the head to lie in, and a little bridge to support the
neck, each depression being of a different size, so as to fit
bodies varying in stature from a full-grown man's to a
small child's, and with little holes bored at intervals to
carry off fluid. And, indeed, if any further confirmation
was required, we had but to look at the wall of the cave
above to find it. For there, sculptured all round the apart-
ment, and looking nearly as fresh as the day it was done,
was the pictorial representation of the death, embalming,
and burial of an old man with a long beard, probably an
ancient king or grandee of this country.

The first picture represented his death. He was lying
ujton a couch which had four short curved posts at the
corners coming to a knob at the end, in appearance some-
thing like a written note of music, and was evidently in
llie very act of expiring. Gathered round the couch were
women and children weeping, the former with their hair
hanging do'mi their back. The next scene represented the
embalmment of the body, which lay nude upon a table with
depressions in it, similar to the one before us ; probably,
indeed, it was a picture of the same table. Three men
were employed at the work — one superintending, one
holding a funnel shaped exactly like a port wine strainer,
of which the narrow end was fixed in an incision in the
breast, no doubt in the great pectoral artery ; while the
third, who was depicted as standing straddle-legged over
the corpse, held a kind of large jug high in his hand, and
poured from it some steaming fluid which fell accurately
into the funnel. The most curious part of this sculpture is
that both the man with the funnel and the man who poured
the fluid are drawn holding their noses, either I suppose
because of the stench arising from the body, or more pro-
br«bly to licep out the aromatic fumes of the hot fluid which

'SHE' 137

was being forced into the dead man's veins. Another
curious thing which I am unable to explain is that all
three men were represented as having a band of linen tied
round the face with holes in it for the eyes.

The third sculpture was a picture of the burial of the
deceased. There he was, stiff and cold, clothed in a linen
robe, and laid out on a stone slab such as I had slept upon
at our first sojourning-place. At his head and feet burnt
lamps, and by his side were placed several of the beautiful
painted vases that I have described, which were perhaps
supposed to be fuU of provisions. The little chamber was
crowded with mourners, and with musicians playing on an
instrument resembling a lyre, while near the foot of the
corpse stood a man with a sheet, with which he was pre-
paring to cover it from view.

These sculptures, looked at merely as works of art, were
so remarkable that I make no apology for describing the^n
rather fully. They struck me also as being of surpassing
interest as representing, probably with studious accuracy,
tlie last rites of the dead as practised among an utterly lost
people, and even then I thought how en\'ious some anti-
quarian friends of my own at Cambridge would be if ever I
got an opportmiity of describing these wonderful remains
to them. Probably they would say that I was exaggerating,
notwithstanding that every page of this history must bear so
much internal evidence of its truth that it would obviously
have been quite impossible for me to have invented it.

To return. As soon as I had hastily examined these
sculptures, which I think I omitted to mention were
executed in relief, we sat down to a very excellent meal of
boiled goat's-fiesh, fresh milk, and cakes made of meal, the
whole being served upon clean wooden platters.

When we had eaten we returned to see how poor Leo
was getting on, BillaH saying that he must now wait upon
She, and hear her commands. On reaching Leo's room
we found the poor boy in a very bad way. He had woke
up from his torpor, and was altogether off his head, bab-
bling about some boat-race on the Cam, and was inclined

138 SHE

to bo violent. Indeed, when wo entered tlie room Ustano
Vi^as liolding him down. I spoke to him, and my voioo
s3omed to soothe him ; at any rate he grew much quieter,
and was persuadsd to swallow a dose of quinine.

I had been sitting with him for an hour, perhaps— at
any rate I know that it was getting so dark that I could
only just make out his head lying like a gleam of gold
upon the pillow we had extemporised out of a bag covered
with a blanket— when suddenly Billali arrived with an air
of great importance, and informed me that She. herself had
deigned to express a wish to sec me — an honour, he added,
accorded to but very few. I think that ho was a little
horrified at my cool way of taking the honour, but the fact
was that I did not feel overwhelmed with gratitude at the
prospect of seeing some savage, dusky queen, however
absolute and mysterious she might be, more especially as
my mind was full of dear Leo, for whose life I began to
have great fears. However, I rose to follow him, and as I
did so I caught sight of something bright lying on the
floor, which I picked up. Perhaps the reader will remem-
ber that with the jpot^ierd^n the casket -was a compo-
sition scaraba3us marked with a romid 0, a goose, and
another curious hieroglyphic, the meaning of which signs
is ' Suten se Eil,' or ' Eoyal Son of the Sun.' This scarab,
which is a very small one, Leo had insisted upon having
set in a massive gold ring, such as is generally used for
signets, and it was this very ring that I now picked up.
He had pulled it off in the paroxysm of his fever, at least
I suppose so, and flung it down upon the rock-floor.
Thinking that if I left it about it might get lost, I slipped
it on to my own little finger, and then followed Billali,
leaving Job and Ustane with Leo.

We passed down the passage, crossed the great aisle-
like cave, and came to the corresponding passage on tho
other side, at the mouth of which the guards stood like
two statues. As we came they bowed their heads in salu-
tation, and then lifting their long spears placed them
transversely across their foreheads, as tho leaders of tho

'SHE' 139

troop tliat had met us had done with their ivory wands.
We stepped between them, and found ourselves in an exactly
similar gallery to that which led to our own apartments,
only this passage was, comparatively speaking, brilliantly
lighted. A few paces down it we were met by four mutes-
two men and~two women^who bowed low and then ar-
ranged themselves, the women in front and the men behind
of us, and m this order we continued our procession past
several doorways hung with curtains resembling those lead-
ing to our own quarters, and which I afterwards found
opened out into chambers occupied by the mutes who
attended on She. A few paces more and we came to
another doorway facing us, and not to our left like the
others, which seemed to mark the termination of the pas-
sage. Here two more white-, or rather yellow-robed guards
were standing, and they too bowed, saluted, and let us
pass through heavy curtains into a great antechamber,
quite forty feet long by as many wide, in which some eight
or ten women, most of them young and handsome, with
yellowish hair, sat on cushions working with ivory needles
at what had the appearance of being embroidery-frames.
These women were also deaf and dumb. At the farther
end of this great lamp-lit apartment was another doorway
closed in with heavy Oriental-looking curtains, quite milikc
those that hung before the doors of our own rooms, and
here stood two particularly liandsomc girl mutes, their
heads bowed upon their bosoms and their hands crossed in
an attitude of the humblest submission. As we advanced
they each stretched out an arm and drew back the curtains.
Thereupon Billali did a curious thing. Down he went,
that venerable-looking old gentleman — for Billali is a gentle-
man at the bottom— down on to his hands and knees, and
in this undignified position, with his long white beard trail-
ing on the ground, he began to creep into the apartment
beyond. I followed him, standing on my feet in the usual
fashion. Looking over his shoulder he perceived it.

' Down, my son ; down, my Baboon ; down on to thy
hands and knees. We enter the presence of She, and, if

I40 SJJE

thou are not humble, of a surety sii3 will blast thee where
thou standest.'

I halted, and felt soared. Indeed, my knees began to
give way of their own mere motion ; but reflection came to
my aid. I was an Englishman, and why, I asked myself,
should I creep into the presence of some savage woman as
though I were a monkey in fact as well as in name ? I
would not and could not do it, that is, unless I was abso-
lutely sure that my life or comfort depended upon it. If
once I began to creep upon my knees I should always have
to do so, and it would be a patent acknowledgment of in-
feriority. So, fortified by an insular prejudice against ' kco-
tooing,' which has, like most of our so-called prejudices, a
good deal of common sense to recommend it, I marched in
boldly after Billali. I found myself in another apartment,
considerably smaller than the anteroom, of which the walls
were entirely hung with rich-looking curtains of the same
make as those over the door, the work, as I subsequently
discovered, of the mutes who sat in the antechamber and
wove them in strips, which were afterwards sewn together.
Also, here and there about the room, were settees of a
beautiful black wood of the ebony tribe, inlaid with ivory,
and all over the floor were other tapestries, or rather rugs.
At the top end of this apartment was what appeared to be
a recess, also draped with curtains, through which shone
rays of light. There was nobody in the place except
ourselves.

Painfully and slowly old BillaU crept up the length of
the cave, and with the most dignified stride that I could
command I followed after him. But I felt that it was
more or less of a failure. To begin with, it is not possible
to look dignified when you are following in the wake of an
old man writhing along on his stomach like a snake, and
then, in order to go sufficiently slowly, either I had to keep
my leg some seconds in the air at every step, or else to
advance with a full stop between each stride, like Mary
Queen of Scots going to execution in a play. Billali was
not good at crawling, I suppose his years stood in the way,

'SHE' 141

and our progress up that apartment was a very long affair.
I was immediately behind him, and several times I was
sorely tempted to help him on with a good kick. It is so
absurd to advance into the presence of savage royalty after
the fashion of an Irishman driving a pig to market, for
that is what we looked like, and the idea nearly made me
burst out laughing then and there. I had to work oif
my dangerous tendency to unseemly merriment by blowing
my nose, a proceeding which filled old Billali with horror,
for he looked over his shoulder and made a ghastly face
at me, and I heard him murmur, ' Oh, my poor Baboon ! '

At last we reached the curtains, and here Billali col-
lapsed flat on to his stomach, with his hands stretched out
before him as though he were dead, and I, not knowing
what to do, began to stare about the place. But presently
I clearly felt that somebody was looking at me from behind
the curtains. I could not see the person, but I could dis-
tinctly feel his or her gaze, and, what is more, it produced
a "very odd effect upon my nerves. I was frightened, I do
not know why. The place was a strange one, it is true,
and looked lonely, notwithstanding its rich hangings and
the soft glow of the lamps— indeed, these accessories added
to, rather- than detracted froin its loneliness, just as a
lighted street at night has always a more solitary appear-
ance than a dark one. It was so silent in the place, and
there lay Billali like one dead before the heavy curtains, ^
through which the odour of perfume seemed to float up
towards the gloom of the arched roof above. Minute grew
into minute, and still there was no sign of life, nor did the
curtain move ; but I felt the gaze of the unknown being
sinkuig through and through me, and filling me with a
nameless terror, till the perspiration stood in beads upon
my brow.

At length the curtain began to move. Who could be
behind it ? — some naked savage queen, a languishing
Oriental beauty, or a nineteenth-century young lady,
drinking afternoon tea ? I had not the slightest idea, and
should not have been astonislicd at seeing any of the

143 SHE

tlireo. I was getting beyond astonishment. The curtain
agitated itself a little, then suddenly between its folds
tliGi'o appeared a most beautiful white hand (white ais
show), and with long tapering fingers, ending in the pinkest
Tiails. The hand grasped the curtain, and drew it aside,
and as it did so I heard a voice, I think the softest and yet
most silvery voice I ever heard. It reminded me of the
murmur of a brook.

' Stranger,' said the voice in Arabic, but much purer
and more classical Arabic than the Amahagger tallc —
' stranger, vdierefore art thou so much afraid ? '

Now I flattered myself that in spite of my inward
terrors I had kept a very fair command of my countenance,
and was, therefore, a little astonished at this question.
Before I had made up my mind how to answer it, however,
the curtain was drawn, and a tall figure stood before us.
I say a figure, for not only the body, but also the face was
wrapped up in soft white, gauzy material in such a way as
at first sight to remind me most forcibly of a corpse in its
grave-clothes. And yet I do not know why it should have
given me that idea, seeing that the wrappings were so thin
that one could distinctly see the gleam of the pink flesh
beneath them. I suppose it was owing to the way in which
they were arranged, either accidentally, or more probably
by design. Anyhow, I felt more frightened than ever at
this ghost-like apparition, and my hair began to rise upon
my head as the feeling crept over me that I was in the
presence of something that was not canny. I could, how-
ever, clearly distinguish that the swathed mummy-like form
before me was that of a tall and lovely woman, instinct
with beauty in every part, and also with a certain snake-
Ijkc grace which I had never seen anything to equal before.
"When she moved a hand or foot her entire frame seemed
to undulate, and the neck did not bend, it curved.

' Why art thou so frightened, stranger ? ' asked the
sweet voice again — a voice which seemed to draw the heart
out of me, like the strains of softest music. ' Is there
that about me that should affright a man ? Then surely

*snE> 143

are men clianged from Tvliat tlioy used to bo ! ' And -ivith a
little coquettish moveraeiit slie turned herself, and held np
one arm, so as to show all her loveliness and the rich hair
of raven blaolmess that streamed in soft ripples down her
snowy robes, almost to her sandalled feet.

' It is thy beauty that makes me fear, oh Queen,'
I answered humbly, scarcely knowing what to say, and I
thought that as I did so I heard old Billali, who was still
lying prostrate on the floor, mutter, ' Good, my Baboon,
good,'

' I see that men still know how to beguile us women
•with false words. Ah, stranger,' she answered, with a
laugh that sounded like distant silver bells, ' thou wast
afraid because mine eyes were searching out thine heart,
therefore wast thou afraid. Eut being but a woman, I
forgive thee for the lie, for it was courteously said. And
now tell me how came ye hither to this land of the
dwellers among caves — a land of swamps and evil things
and dead old shadows of the dead ? What came ye for to
see ? How is it that ye hold your lives so cheap as to
place them in the hollow of the hand of Hiya, into the
hand of " She-wlio-must-he-olcyad " ? Tell me also hoy/
come ye to know the tongue I talk. It is an ancicpt
tongue, that sweet child of the old Syriac. Liveth it yet in
the world ? Thou seest I dwell among the caves and the
dead, and naught know I of the affairs of men, nor have
I cared to know. I have lived, oh stranger, with my
memories, and my memories are in a grave that mine own
hands hollowed, for truly hath it boon said that the child
of man maketh his own path evil ; ' and her beautiful voice
quivered, and broke in a note as soft as any wood-bird's.
Suddenly her eye fell upon the sprawling frame of Billali,
and she seemed to recollect herself.

' Ah ! thou art there, old man. Tell me how it is that
things have gone wrong in thine household. Forsooth, it
seems that these my guests were set upon. Ay, and one
was nigh to being slain by the hot pot to be eaten of those
brutes, thy children, and had not the others fought gallantly

144 ^^i^'

tliey too had been slain, and not even I could have
called back the life which had been loosed from the body.
What meansit, old man? What hast thou to say that I should
not give thee over to those who execute my vengeance ? '

Her voice had risen in her anger, and it rang clear and
cold against the rooky walls. Also I thought I could see
her eyes flash through the gauze that hid them. I saw
poor Billali, whom I had believed to be a very fearless
person, positively quiver with terror at her words.

' Oh " Hiya ! " oh She ! ' he said, without lifting his
white head from the floor. ' Oh She, as thou art great
be merciful, for I am now as ever thy servant to obey. It
was no plan or fault of mine, oh She, it was those wicked
ones who are called my children. Led on by a woman
whom thy guest the Pig had scorned, they would have
followed the ancient custom of the land, and eaten the fat
black stranger who came hither with these thy guests the
Baboon and the Lion who is sick, thinking that no word
liad come from thee about the Black one. But when the
Baboon and the Lion saw what they would do, they slew
the woman, and slew also their servant to save him from
the horror of the pot. Then those evil ones, ay, those
children of the Wicked One who lives in the Pit, they
went mad with the lust of blood, and flew at the throats
of the Lion and the Baboon and the Pig. But gallantly
they fought. Oh Hiya ! they fought like very men, and
slew many, and held their own, and then I came and
saved them, and the evildoers have I sent on hither to Kor
to be judged of thy greatness, oh She ! and here they are.'

' Ay, old man, I know it, and to-morrow will I sit in tho
great hall and do justice upon them, fear not. And for
thee, I forgive thee, though hardly. See that thou dost
keep thine household better. Go.'

Billali rose upon his knees with astonishing alacrity,
bowed his head thrice, and, his white beard sweeping the
ground, crawled down the apartment as he had crawled up
it, till he finally vanished through the curtains, leaving me,
not a little to my alarm, alone with this terrible but most
fascinating person.

MS

xin.

ATBSHA UNVEILS.

'Theke,' said She, 'he has gone, the white-bearded old
fool ! Ah, how little knowledge does a man acquire in his
life. He gathereth it up lilce water, but hke water it runneth
through his fingers, and yet, if his hands be but wet as
though with dew, behold a generation of fools call out,
" See, he is a wise man ! " Is it not so ? But how call they
thee ? " Baboon," he says,' and she laughed ; ' but that is
the fashion of these savages who lack imagination, and fly
to the beasts they resemble for a name. How do they call
thee in thine own country,' stranger?

' They call me Holly, oh Queen, I answered.'

' HoUy,' she answered, speaking the word with diffi-
culty, and yet with a most charming accent ; ' and what is
"Holly"?'

' " Holly " is a prickly tree,' I said.

' So. Well, thou hast a prickly and yet a tree-hke look.
Stroiig art. thou, and ugly, but, if my -wisdom be not at
fault, honest at the core, and a staff to lean on. Also one
■jdio- thinks. But stay, oh Holly, stand not there, enter
with me and be seated by me. I would not see thee crawl
before me like those slaves. I am aweary of their worship
and their terror ; sometimes when they vex me I could
blast them for very sport, and to see the rest turn white,
even to the heart.' And she held the curtain aside with
her ivory hand to let me pass in.

I entered, shuddering. This woman was very terrible.
Within the curtains was a recess, about twelve feet by ten,
and in the recess was a couch and a table whereon stood
fruit and sparkling water. By it, at its end, was a vessel

h

145 SHE

like a font cut in carved stone, also full of pure water.
The place was softly lit with lamps formed out of the
beautiful vessels of which I have spoken, and the air and
curtains were laden with a subtle perfume. Perfume
too seemed to emanate from the glorious hair and white-
cUnging vestments of She herself. I entered the little
room, and there stood uncertain.

' Sit,' said She, pointing to the couch. ' As yet thou
hast no cause to fear me. If thou hast cause, thou shalt
not fear for long, for I shall slay thee. Therefore let thy
heart be Hght.'

I sat down on the end of the couch near to the font-like
basin of water, and She sank down softly on to the other
end. ■ ■'■

'Now, Holly,' she said',' ~' how comest thou to speak
Arabic ? It is my own dear tongue, for Arabian am I by
my birth, even " al Arab al Ariba " (an Arab of the Arabs),
and of the race of our father Yarab, the son of Kahtan, for
in that fair and ancient city Ozal was I born, in the province
of Yaman the Happy. Yet dost thou not speak it as we
used to speak. Thy talk doth lack the music of the sweet
tongue of the tribes of Hamyar which I was wont to hear.
Some of the words too seemed changed, even as among
these Amahagger, who have debased and defiled its purity,
so that I must speak with them in what is to me another
tongue.' '

' I have studied it,' I answered, ' for many years. Also
the language is spoken in Egypt and elsewhere.'

' So it is still spoken, ard there is yet an Egypt ? And
what Pharaoh sits upon the throne ? Still one of the
spawn of the Persian Oohus, or are tlie Achfenienians
gone, for far is it to the days of Ochus.'

' Yarab the son of Kuhtsin, who lived some centuries before the
time of Abraham, was the father of the ancient Arabs, and gave its
name Araba to the country. In speaking of herself as ' al Arab al
Ariba,' She no doubt meant to convoy that she was of the true Arab
blood as distinguished from the naturalised Arabs, the descendants of
Ismael, the son of Abraham and Hagar, who were known as ' al Arab al
mostAreba.' The dialect of the Koreish was usually called the clear
or ' jjerspicuous ' Arabic, but the Hamaritio dialect approached
nearer to the purity of the mother Syriac— L. H. H.

AVESHA U A VEILS'- 147

'The Persians liave been gone from Egypt for nigh two
thousand years, and since then the Ptolemies, the Eomans,
and many others have flourished and held sway upon the
Nile, and fallen when their time was ripe,' I said, aghast.
' What canst thou know of the Persian Artaxerxes ? ''

She laughed, and made no answer, and agam a cold
chiU went through me. ' And Greece,' she said ; ' is therp
still a Greece ? Ah, I loved the Greeks. Beautiful were
they as the day, and clever, but fierce at heart and fickle,
notwithstanding.'

' Yes,' I said, ' there is a Greece ; and, just now, is it
once more a people. Yet the Greeks of to-day are not
what the Greeks of the old time were, and Greece herself
is but a mockery of the Greece that was.'

' So ! The Hebrews, are they yet at Jerusalem ? And
does the Temple that the wise king built stand, and if so,
what God do they worship therein ? Is their Messiah
come, of whom they preached so much and prophesied so
loudly, and doth He rule the earth ? '

' The Jews are broken and gone, and the fragments of
their people strew the world, and Jerusalem is no more.
As for the temple that Herod built '

' Herod ! ' she said. ' I know not Herod. But go on.'

' The Eomans burnt it, and the Eoman eagles flew
across its ruins, and now Judsea is a desert.'

' So, so ! They were a great people, those Eomans,
and went straight to their end — ay, they sped to it like
Fate, or like their own eagles on their prey! — and left
peace behind them.'

' Sohtudinem faciunt, pacem appellant,' I suggested.

' Ah, thou canst speak the Latin tongue, too ! ' she
said, in surprise. ' It hath a strange ring in my ears after
all these days, and it seems to me that thy accent does not
fall as the Eomans put it. Who was it wrote that ? I
know not the saying, but it is a true one of that great
people. It seems that I have found a learned man— one
whose hands have held the water of .the world's knowledge.
Knowest thou Greek also ? '

I, 2

148 SHE

'Yes, oh Queen, and something of Hebrew, but
not to speak them well. They are all dead languages
now.'

She clapped her hands in childish glee. ' Of a truth,
ugly tree that thou art, thou growest the fruits of wisdom,
oh, Holly,' she said, ' but of those Jews whom I hated, for
they called me "heathen " when I would have taught them
my philosophy. Did their Messiah come, and doth He
rule the world ? '

' Their Messiah came,' I answered with reverence ; ' but
He came poor and lowly, and they would have none of
Him. They scourged Him, and crucified Him upon a tree,
but yet His words and His works live on, for He was the
Son of God, and now of a truth He doth rule half the
world, but not with an Empire of the World.'

' Ah, the fierce-hearted wolves,' she said, ' the followers
of Sense and of many gods — greedy of gain and faction-
torn. 1 can see their dark ffices yet. So they crucified
their Messiah ? Well can I believe it. That he was a Son
of the Livmg Spirit would be naught to them, if indeed
He was so, and of that we will talk afterwards. They
would care naught for any God if he came not with pomp
and power. They, a chosen people, a vessel of Him they
call Jehovah, ay, and a vessel of Baal, and a vessel of
Astoreth, and a vessel of the gods of the Egyptians — a
high-stomached people, greedy of aught that brought them
wealth and power. So they crucified their Messiah be-
cause He came in lowly gtiise — and now are they scattered
about the earth. Why, if I remember, so said one of their
prophets that it should be. Well, let them go — they broke
my heart, those Jews, and made me look with evil eyes
across the vrorld, ay, and drove me to this wilderness, this
place of a people that was before them. When I would have
taught them wisdom in Jerusalem they stoned me, ay, at
the Gate of the Temple those white-bearded hypocrites and
Eabbis hounded the people on to stone me ! See, here is
the mark of it to this day ! ' and with a sudden move she
pulled up the gauzy wrapping on her rounded arm, and

AYESHA UNVEILS 149

pointed to a little scar that showed red against its milky
beauty.

I shrank back horrified.

' Pardon me, oh Queen,' I said, ' but I am bewildered.
Nigh upon two thousand years have rolled across the earth
since the Jewish Messiah hung upon His cross at Golgotha.
How then canst thou have taught thy philosophy to the
Jews before He was ? Thou art a woman, and no spirit.
How can a woman live two thousand years ? Why dost
thou befool me, oh Queen ? '

She leaned back on the couch, and once more I felt
the hidden eyes playing upon me and searching out my
heart.

'Oh man ! ' she said at last, speaking very slowly and
deliberately, ' it seems that there are still things upon tho
earth of which thou knowest naught. Dost thou still
believe that all things die, even as those very Jews be-
lieved ? I tell thee that naught really dies. There is no
such thing as Death, though there be a thing called
Change. See,' and she pointed to some sculptures on the
rocky wall. ' Three times two thousand years have passed
since the last of the great race that hewed those pictures
fell before the breath of the pestilence which destroyed them,
yet are they not dead. E'en now they live; perchance
their spirits are drawn toward us at this very hour,' and
she glanced round. ' Of a surety it sometimes seems to
me that my eyes can see them.'

' Yes, but to the world they are dead.'

' Ay, for a time ; but even to the world are they born
again and again. I, yes I, Ayesha' — for that is my
name, stranger — I say to thee that I wait now for one I
loved to be born again, and here I tarry till he finds me,
knowing of a surety that hither he will come, and that
here, and here only, shall he greet me. Why, dost thou
suppose that I, who am all powerful, I, whose loveliness
is more than the loveliness of the Grecian Helen, of
whom they used to sing, and whose wisdom is wider, ay,

' Pronounced Assha. — L. H. H.

150 SHE

far more wicTe and deep tlian the ■wisdom of Solomon the
Wise, — I, who know the secrets of the earth and its riches,
and can turn all things to my uses, — I, who have even for
a while overcome Cliange, that ye call Death, — why, I
say, oh stranger, dost thou think that I herd here with
barbarians lower than the beasts ? '

' I know not,' I said humbly.

' Because I wait for him I love. My life has perchance
been evil, I know not — for who can say what is evil and
what good ? — so I fear to die even if I could die, which I
cannot until mine hour comes, to go and seek him where
he is ; for between us .there might rise a wall I could not
climb, at least, I dread it. Surely easy would it be also to
lose the way in seeking in those great spaces wherein the
planets wander on forever. But the day will come, it may
be when five thousand more years have passed, and are
lost and melted into the vault of Time, even as the little
clouds melt into the gloom of night, or it may be to-morrow,
when he, my love, shall be born again, and then, following
a law that is stronger than any human plan, ho shall find
me horc, where once he knew me, and of a surety his heart
will soften towards mo though I sinned against him ; ay,
even though he know me not again, yet will he love me,
if only for my beauty's sake.'

For a moment I was dumbfounded, and coiild not
answer. The matter was too overpowering for my intellect
to grasp.

' But even so, oh Queen,' I said at last, ' even if we
men be born again and again, that is not so with thee, if
thou speakest truly.' Here she looked up sharply, and
once more I caught the flash of those hidden eyes ; ' thou,'
I went on hurriedly, ' who hast never died ? '

' That is so,' she said ; ' and it is so because I have, half
by chance and half by learning, solved one of the great
secrets of the world. Tell mo, stranger : life is — why there-
fore should not life be lengthened for a while? What are
ten or twenty or fifty thousand years in the history of life ?
Why in ten thousand years scarce will the rain and storms

A YES HA UNVEILS 151

lessen a mountain, top by a span in thickness ? In two
thousand years these eaves have not changed, nothing has
changed, but the beasts and man, who is as the beasts.
There is naught that is wonderful about the matter, couldst
thou but understand. Life is wonderful, ay, but that it
should be a .little lengthened is not wonderful. Nature
hath her animating spirit as well as man, who is Nature's
child, and he who can find that spirit, and let it breathe
upon him, shall live with her life. He shall not live
eternally, for Nature is not eternal, and she herself must
die, even as the nature of the moon hath died. She her-
self must die, I say, or rather change and sleep till it be
time for her to live again. But when shall she die ? Not
yet, I ween, and while she lives, so shall he who hath all her
secret live with her. All I have it not, yet have I some,
more perchance than any who were before me. Now, to
thee I doubt not that this thing is a great mystery, there-
fore I will not overcome thee with it now. Another time
will I tell thee more if the mood be on me, though per-
chamo I shall never speak thereof again. Dost thou
wonder how 1 knew that yo were comuig to this land, and
so saved your heads from the hot pot ? '

' Ay, oh Queen,' I answered feebly,

' Then gaze upon that water,' and she pointed to the
font-lilie vessel, and then, bending forward, held her
hand over it,

I rose and gazed, and instantly the water darkened.
Then it cleared, and I saw as distinctly as I ever saw any-
thing in my life — I saw, I say, our boat upon that horrible
canal. There was Leo lying at the bottom asleep in it,
with a coat thrown over him to keep off the mosquitoes, in
such a fashion as to hide his face, and myself. Job, and
Mahomed towing on the banlc.

I started back aghast, and cried out that it was magic,
for I recognised the whole scene — it was one which had
actually occurred.

' Nay, nay ; oh. Holly,' she answered, ' it is no magic ;
that is a fiction of ignorance. There is no such thing as

IS2 SHE

magic, though there is such a thing as a Imowledge of the
secrets of Nature. That water is my glass ; in it I see
■what passes if I care to summon up the pictures, which is
not often. Therein I can show thee what thou wilt of the
past, if it be anything to do with this country and with
what I have known, or anything that thou, the gazer, hast
known. Think of a face if thou wilt, and it shall be re-
flected from thy mind upon the water. I know not all the
secret yet — I can read nothing in the future. But it is an
old secret ; I did not find it. In Arabia and in Egypt the
sorcerers Imew it centuries ago. So one day I chanced
to bethink me of that old canal — some twenty centuries
ago I sailed upon it, and I was minded to look thereon
again. And so I looked, and there I saw the boat and three
men walking, and one, whose face I could not see, but a
youth of a noble foiw, sleeping in the boat, and so I sent
and saved ye. And now farewell. But stay, tell me of
this youth — the Lion, as the old man calls him. I would
look upon him, but he is sick, thou say est— sick with the
fever, and also wounded in the fray.'

' He is very sick,' I answered sadly ; ' canst thou do
nothing for him, oh Queen ! who knowest so much ? '

' Of a surety I can. I can cure him ; but why speakest
thou so sadly? Doth thou love the youth? Is he per-
chance thy son ? '

' He is my adopted son, oh Queen ! Shall he bo brought
in before thee ? '

' Nay. How long hath the fever taken him ?

' This is the third day.'

' Good ; then let him lie another day. Then will he
perqhance throw it off by his own strength, and that is
better than that I should cuie him, for my medicine is of a
sort to shake the life in its very citadel. If, however, by
to-morrow night, at that hour when the fever first took
him, he doth not begin to mend, then will I come to him
and cure him. Slay, who nurses him ? '

' Our white servant, him whom Billali names the Pig ;
also,' and hero I spolie mth some httle hesitation, 'a

AVESHA UNVEILS 153

Woman named Ustane, a very handsome woman of this
country, who came and embraced him when first she saw
him, and hath stayed by him ever since, as I understand is
the fashion of thy people, oh Queen.'

' My people ! speak not to me of my people,' she an-
swered, hastily ; ' these slaves are no people of mine, they
are but dogs to do my bidding till the day of my dehverance
comes ; and, as for their customs, naught have I to do with
them. Also, call me not Queen — I am sick of flattery and
titles — caU me Ayesha, the name hath a sweet sound in
mine ears, it is an echo fi-om the past. As for this Ustane,
I know not. I wonder if it be she against whom I was
warned, and whom I in turn did warn ? Hath she — stay,
I wiU see ; ' and, bending forward, she passed her hand
over the font of water and gazed intently into it. ' See,'
she said quietly, ' is that the woman ? '

I looked into the water, and there, mirrored upon its
placid surface, was the silhouette of Ustane's stately face.
She was bending forward, with a look of infinite tenderness
upon her features, watching something beneath her, and
with her chestnut locks falling on to her right shoulder.

'It is she,' I said, in a low voice, for once more I felt
much disturbed at this most uncommon sight. ' She
watches Leo. asleep.'

' Loo ! ' said Ayesha, in an absent voice ; ' why, that is
"lion" in the Latin tongue. The old man hath named
happily for once. It is very strange,' she went on speaking
to herself, ' very. So like — but it is not possible 1 ' With
an impatient gesture she passed her hand over the water
once more. It darkened, and the image vanished silently
and mysteriously as it had risen, and once more the lamp-
light, and the lamplight only, shone on the placid surface of
that limpid, living mirror.

'Hast thou aught to ask me before thou goest, oh
Holly ? ' she said, after a few moments' reflection. ' It is
but a rude life that thou must live here, for these people
are savages, and know not the ways of cultivated man.
Not that I am troubled thereby, for, behold my food,' and

1 54 SHE

she pointed to the fruit upon the little table. ' Naught but
fruit doth ever pass my lips— fruit and cakes of flom-, and a
little water. I have bidden my girls to wait upon thee.
They are mutes thou knowest, deaf are they and dumb, and
therefore the safest of servants, save to those who can read
their faces and their signs. ,1 bred them so — it hath taken
many centuries and much trouble ; but at last I have tri-
umphed. Once I succeeded before, but the race was too
ugly, so I let it die away ; but now, as thou seest, they are
otherwise. Once, too, I reared a race of giants, but after
a while Nature would no more of it, and it died away.
Hast thou aught to ask of mo ? '

' Ay, one thing, oh Ayesha,' I said boldly ; but feeling
by no means as bold as I trust I looked. ' I would gaze
upon thy face.'

She laughed out in her bell-hke notes. ' Bethink thee,
Holly,' she answered ; ' bethink thee. It seems that thou
knowest the old myths of the gods of Greece. Was there
not one Actseon who perished miserably because he looked
on too much beauty ? If I show thee my face, perchance
thou wouldst perish miserably also ; perchance thou wouldst
cat out thy heart m impotent deshe ; for know I am not
for thee — I am for no man, save one, who hath been, but
is not yet.'

' As thou wilt, Ayesha,' I said. ' I fear not thy beauty.
I have put my heart away from such vanity as woman's
loveliness, that passes like a flower.'

' Nay, thou errest,' she said ; ' that does not pass. My
beauty endures even as I endure ; still if thou wilt, oh rash
man, have thy will ; but blame not me if passion mount
thy reason, as the Egyptian breakers used to mount a
colt, and guide it whither thou wilt not. Never may the
man to whom my beauty hath been unveiled XDut it from
his mind, and therefore even with these savages do I go
veiled, lest they vex me, and I should slay them. Say,
wilt thou see ? '

' I will,' I answered, my curiosity overpowering me.

She hfted her vfliite and rounded arms— never had I

AYESHA UNVEILS

iSS

seen euch arms before — and slowly, very slowly, withdrew
some fastening beneath her hair. Then all of a sudden
the long, corpse-like wrappings fell from her to the gromid,
and my eyes travelled up her form, now only robed in a garb
of clinging white that did but serve to show its perfect and
imperial shape, instinct with a hfe that was more than life,
and with a certain serpent-like grace that was more than
human. On her little feet were sandals, fastened with
studs of gold. Then cilme ankles more perfect than ever
sculptor dreamed of. About the waist her white kirtle was
fastened by a double-headed snake of solid gold, above
which her gracious form swelled up in Imes as pure as they
were lovely, till the kirtle ended on the snowy argent of
her breast, whereon her arms were folded. I gazed above
them at her face, and — I do not exaggerate— shrank back
blinded and amazed. I have heard of the beauty of celes-
tial beings, now I saw it ; only this beauty, with all its
awful loveliness and purity, was evil — at least, at the time,
it struck mo as evil. How am I to describe it ? I cannot
— Eimily, I cannot! The man does not hve whose pen
could convey a sense of what I saw. I might talk of the
great changing eyes of deepest, softest black, of the tinted
face, of the broad and noble brow, on which the hair grew
low, and delicate, straight features. But, beautiful, sur-
passingly beautiful as they all were, her loveliness did not
He in them. It lay rather, if it can be said to have had
any fixed abiding place, in a visible majesty, in an imperial
grace, in a godlike stamp of softened power, which shone
upon that radiant countenance like a living halo. Never
before had I guessed what beauty made sublime could be —
and yet, the sublimity was a dark one — the glory was not
all of heaven — though none the less was it glorious.
Though the face before me was that of a young woman of
certainly not more than thirty years, in perfect health, and
the first flush of ripened beauty, yet it had stamped upon
it a look of unutterable experience, and of deep acquaint-
ance with grief and passion. Not even the lovely smile
that crept about the dimples of her mouth could hide this

156 SHE

shadow of sin and sorrow. It slione even in the light of
the glorious eyes, it was present in the air of majesty, and
it seemed to say : ' Behold me, lovely as no woman was or
is, undying and half-divine ; memory haunts me from age
to age, and passion leads me by the hand — evil have I
done, and with sorrow have I made acquaintance from age
to age, and from age to age evil I shall do, and sorrow shall
I know till my redemption comes.'

Drawn by some magnetic force which I could not resist,
I let my eyes rest upon her shining orbs, and felt a current
pass from them to me that bewildered and half-bhndcd
me.

She laughed — ah, how musically ! and nodded her little
head at me with an air of sublimated coquetry that would
have done credit to a Venus Victrix.

' Eash man ! ' she said ; ' like Actteon, thou hast had
thy will ; be careful lest, like Actseon, thou too dost perish
miserably, torn to pieces by the ban-hounds of thine own
passions. I too, oh Holly, am a virgin goddess, not to be
moved of any man, save one, and it is not thou. Say,
hast thou seen enough ! '

' I have looked on bdauty, and I am blinded,' I said
hoarsely, lifting my hand to cover up my eyes.

' So ! what did I tell thee ? Beauty is like the light-
ning ; it is lovely, but it destroys — especially trees, oh
Holly ! ' And again she nodded and laughed.

Suddenly she paused, and through my fingers I saw
an awful change come over her countenance. Her great
eyes suddenly fixed themselves into an expression in which
horror seemed to struggle with some tremendous hope
arising through the depths of her dark soul. The lovely
face grew rigid, and the gracious, willowy form seemed to
erect itself.

' Man,' she half whispered, half hissed, throwing back
her head like a snake about to strike — ' man, where didst
thou get that scarab on thy hand? Speak, or by the
Spirit of Life I will blast thee where thou standest ! ' and
she took one light step towards me, and from her eyes

A YE SUA UNVEILS 157

there shone such an awful light — to me it seemed almost
like a flame — that I fell, then and there, on the ground
before her, babbling confusedly in my terror.

'Peace,' she said, with a sudden change of manner,
and speaking in her former soft voice, ' I did affright thee !
Forgive me ! But at times, oh Holly, the almost infinite
mind grows impatient of the slowness of the very finite,
and I am tempted to use my power out of pure vexation —

very nearly wast thou dead, but I remembered . But

the scarab — about the scaraboeus ! '

' I picked it up,' I gurgled feebly, as I got on to my feet
again, and it is a solemn fact that my mind was so dis-
turbed that at the moment I could remember nothing else
about the ring except that I had picked it up in Leo's cave.

' It is very strange,' she said, with a sudden access of
womanHke trembling and agitation which seemed out of
place in this awful woman — ' but once I knew a scarab like
that. It — hung round the neck — of one I loved,' and she
gave a nttle sob, and I saw that after all she was only a
woman, although she might be a very old one.

'There,' she went on, 'it must be one like it, and yet
never did I see one hke it, for thereto hung a history, and
he who wrote it prized it much. ' But the scarab that I knew
was not set thus in the bezel of a ring. Go now. Holly,
go, and, if thou canst, try to forget that thou hast looked
upon Ayesha's beauty,' and, turning from me, she flung
herself on her couch, and buried her face in the cushions.

As for me, I stumbled from her presence, and I do not
remember how I reached my own cave.

' I am informed by a renowned and most learned Egyptologist,
to whom I have submitted this very interesting and beautifully
finished scarab, ' Suten se Ea,' that he has never seen one resembling
it. Although it bears a title frequently given to Egyptian royalty,
he is of opinion that it is not necessarily the cartouche of a Pharaoh,
on which either the throne or personal name of the monarch is
generally inscribed. What the history of this particular scarab may
have been we can now, unfortunately, never know, but I have little
doubt but that it played some part in the tragic story of the Princsss
Amenartas and her lover Kallikrates, the forsworn priest of Isis. —
EDiion,

IS8 SHE

XIV.

A BOUL IN HELL.

It was nearly ten o'clock at night ^vhea I cast myself
down upon my bed, and began to gather my scattered wits,
and reflect upon what I had seen and heard. But the
more I reflected the less I could make of it. "Was I mad,
or drunk, or dreaming, or was I merely the victim of a
gigantic and most elaborate hoax ? How was it possible
that I, a rational man, not unacquainted with the leading
scientific facts of our history, and hitjierto an absolute and
utter disbeliever in all the hocus-pocus that in Em-ope
goes by the name of the supernatural, could believe that
I had within the last few minutes been engaged in conver-
sation with a woman two thousand and odd years old ?
The thing v/as contrary to the experience of human nature,
and absolutely and utterly impossible. It miist be a hoax,
and yet, if it were a hoax, what was I to make of it ?
"What, too, was to be said of the figures on the water,
of the woman's extraordinary acquaintance with the re-
mote past, and her ignorance, or apparent ignorance,
of any subsequent history ? What, too, of her wonder-
ful and awful loveliniss? This,' at any rate, was a
patent fact, and beyond the experience of the world. No
merely mortal woman could shine with such a super-
natural radiance. About that she had, at any rate, been
in the right — it was not safe for any man to look upon
such beauty. I was a hardened vessel in such matters,
having, with the exception of one painful experience
of my green and tender youth, put the softer sex (I
sometimes think that this is a misnomer) almost entirely
out of my thoughts. But now, to my intense horror, I
kncio that I could never put away the vision of those

A SOUL IN HELL 159

glorious eyes ; and, alas ! the very diablerie of the woman,
whilst it horrified and repelled, attracted in even a greater
degree. A person with the experience of two thousand
years at her back, with the command of such tremendous
powers and the knowledge of a mystery that could hold off
death, was certainly worth falling in love with, if over
woman was. But, alas ! it was not a question of whether
or no she was worth it, for so far as I could judge, not being
versed in such matters, I, a fellow of my college, noted
for what my acquaintances are pleased to caU my misogyny,
and a respectable man now well on in middle life, bad
fallen absolutely and hopelessly in love with tins white
sorceress. Nonsense ; it must be nonsense ! She liad
warned me fairly, and I had refused to take the warning.
Curses on the fatal curiosity that is ever prompting man
to draw the veil from woman, and curses on the natural
impulse that begets it ! It is the cause of half— ay, and
more than half, of our misfortmies. Why cannot man be
content to live alone and be happy, and let the women live
alone and bo happy too ? But perhaps they would not be
happy, and I am not sure that we should either. Here
was a nice state of affairs. I, at my' age, to fall a victim
to this modern Circe ! But then she was not modern, at
least she said not. She was almost as ancient as the
original Circe.

I tore my hair, and jumped up from my couch, feeling
that if I did not do something I should go off my head.
What did she mean about the scarabnsus too ? It was
Leo's BcarabiEus, and had come out of the old coffer
that Vincey had left in my rooms nearly one-and-twenty
years before. Could it be, after all, that the whole story
was true, and the writing on the sherd was net a forgery,
or the invention of some crack-brained, long-forgotten in-
dividual ? And if so, could it be that Leo was the man
that She was waiting for — -the dead man who was to be
born again ! Impossible again ! The whole thing was
gibberish ! Who ever heard of a man being born again ?

But if it were possible that a woman could exist for

i6o ^HE

two thousand years, this might he possible also — anything
might be possible. I myself might, for aught I knew, be a
reincarnation of some other forgotten self, or perhaps the
last of a long line of ancestral selves. Well, vive la guerre !
why not ? Only, unfortunately, I had no recollection of
these previous conditions. The idea was so absurd to me
that I burst out laughing, and, addressing the sculptured
picture of a grim-looking warrior on the cave wall, called
out to him aloud, ' Who knows, old fellow ? — perhaps I
was your contemporary. By Jove 1 perhaps I was you and
you are I,' and then I laughed again at my own folly, and
the sound of my laughter rang dismally along the vaulted
roof, as though the ghost of the warrior had uttered the
ghost of a laugh.

Next I bethought me that I had not been to see how
Leo was, so, taking up one of the lamps which was burning
at my bedside, I slipped off my shoes and crept down the
passage to the entrance of his sleeping cave. The draught
of the night air was lifting his curtain to and fro gently, as
though spirit hands were drawing and redrawing it. I slid
into the vault-like apartment, and looked round. There was
a Hght by which I could see that Leo was lying on the couch,
tossing restlessly in his fever, but asleep. At his side, half-
lying on the floor, half-leaning against the stone couch, was
Ustane. She held his hand in one of hers, but she too
was dozing, and the two made a pretty, or rather a pathetic,
picture. Poor Leo ! his cheek was burning red, there were
dark shadows beneath his eyes, and his breath came heavily.
He was very, very ill; and again the horrible fear seized mo
that he might die, and I be left alone in the world. And
yet if he lived he would perhaps be my rival with Ayeslia ;
even if he were not the man, what chance should I,
middle-aged and hideous, have against his bright youth
and beauty ? Well, thank Heaven ! my sense of right was
not dead. Slia had not killed that yet ; and, as I stood there,
I prayed to the Almighty in my heart that my boy, my more
than son, might live — ay, even if he proved to be the man.

Then I went back as softly as I had come, but still I

A SOUL IN HELL i6i

could not sleep ; the sight and thought of dear Leo lying
there so ill had but added fuel to the fire of my unrest.
My wearied body and overstrained mind awakened all my
imagination into preternatural activity. Ideas, visions,
almost inspirations, floated before it with starthng vivid-
ness. Most of them were grotesque enough, some were
ghastly, some recalled thoughts and sensations that had
for years been buried in the dibris of my past life. But,
behind and above them all, hovered the shape of that
awful woman, and through them gleamed the memory of
her entrancing loveliness. Up and down the cave I strode
— up and down.

Suddenly I observed, what I had not noticed before,
that there was a narrow aperture in the rocky wall. I
took up the lamp and examined it ; the aperture led to a
passage. Now, I was still sufficiently. sensible to remember
that it is not pleasant, in such a situation as ours was, to
have passages running into one's bed-chamber from no
one laiows where. If there are passages, people can come
up them ; they can come up when one is asleep. Partly
to see where it went to, and partly from a restless desire
to be domg something, I followed the passage. It led
to a stone stair, which I descended ; the stair ended in
another passage, or rather tunnel, also hewn out of tlie
bed-rock, and running, so far as I could judge, exactly
beneath the gallery that led to the entrance of our rooms,
and across the great central cave. I went on down it : it
was as silent as the grave, but still, drawn by some sensa-
tion or attraction that I cannot describe, I followed on, my
stockinged feet falling without noise on the smooth and
rocky floor. When I had traversed some fifty yards of
space, I came to another passage running at right angles,
and here an awful thing happened to me : the sharp
draught caught my lamp and extinguished it, leaving mo
in utter darkness in the bowels of that mysterious place.
I took a couple of strides forward so as to clear the bisect-
ing tunnel, being terribly afraid lest I should turn up it
in Uie dark if once I got confused as to the direction, a.nd

M

i62 SHE

then paused to think. What was I to do ? . I had no
match ; it seemed awful to attempt that long journey back
through the utter gloom, and yet I could not stand there
all night, and, if i did, probably it would not help me
much, for in the bowels of the rock it would be as dark at
midday as at midnight. I looked back over my shoulder —
not a sight or a sound. I peered forward down the dark-
ness : surely, far away, I saw something like the faint glow
of fire. Perhaps it was a cave where I could get a light —
at any rate, it was worth investigating. Slowly and pain-
fully I crept along the tunnel, keeping my hand against
its wall, and feeling at every step with my foot before I
put it down, fearing lest I should fall into some pit. Thirty
paces — there was a light, a broad light that came and went,
shining through curtains ! Fifty paces — it was close at
hand ! Sixty — oh, great heaven !

I was at the curtams, and they did not hang close, so
I could see clearly into the little cavern beyond them. It
had all the appearance of being a tombj and was lit up by
a fire that burnt in its centre with a whitish flame and
without smoke. Indeed, there, to the left, was a stone
shelf with a Uttle ledge to it three inches or so high, and
on tho shelf lay what I took to be a corpse ; at any rate,
it looked like one, with something white thrown over it.
To the right was a similar shelf, on which lay some broi-
dered coverings. Over the fire bent the figure of a woman ;
she was sideways to me and facing the corpse, wrapped in
a dark mantle that hid her like a nun's cloak. She seemed
to be staring at the flickering flame. Suddenly, as I was
trying to make up my mind what to do, with a convulsive
movement that somehow gave an impression of despairmg
energy, the woman rose to her feet and cast the dark cloak
from her.

It was She herself !

She was clothed, as I had seen her when she unveiled,
in the kirtle of clinging white, cut low upon her bosom,
and bound in at the waist with the barbaric double-headed
snake, and, as before, her rippling black hair fell in heavy

A SOUL 2N HELL 163

masses down her back. But her face was what caught my
eye, and held me as in a vice, not this time by the force of
its beauty, but by the power of fascinated terror. The
beauty was still there, indeed, but the agony, the blind
passion, and the awful vindictiveness displayed upon those
quivering features, and in the tortured look of the upturned
eyes, were such as surpass my powers of description.

For a moment she stood still, ];ier hands raised high
above her head, and as she did so the white robe slipped
from her down to her golden girdle, baring tie blinding
loveliness of her form. She stood there, her fingers
clenched, and the awful look of malevolence gathered and
deepened on her face.

Suddenly, I thought of what would happen if she dis-
covered me, and the reflection made me turn sick and
faint. But even if I had known that I must die if I
stopped, I do not believe that I could have moved, for I
was absolutely fascinated. But still I knew my danger.
Supposing she should hear me, or see me through the
curtain, supposing I even sneezed, or that her magic told
her that she was being watched— swift indeed would be
my doom.

Down came the clenched hands to her sides, then up
again above her head, and, as I am a living and honour-
able man, the white flame of the fire leapt up after them,
almost to the roof, throwing a fierce and ghastly glare upon
She herself, upon the white figure beneath the covering,
and every scroll and detail of the rockwork.

Down came the ivory arms again, and as they did so
she spoke, or rather hissed, in Arabic, in a note that
curdled my blood, and for a second stopped my heart.

' Curse her, may she be everlastingly accursed.'

The arms fell and the flame sank. Up they went
again, and the broad tongue of fire shot up after them ;
then again they fell.

' Curse her memory — accursed be the memory of the
Egyptian.'

Up again, and -again down.

M 2

i64 SHE

' Curse her, the fair daughter of the Nile, because of
her beauty.'

' Curseher, because her magic hath prevailed against mCi'

' Curse her, because she kept my beloved from me.' . ,

And again the flame dwindled and shrank.

She put her hands before her eyes, and, abandoning the
hissing tone, cried aloud : —

' What is the use of cursing ?— she prevailed, and she
is gone.'

Then she recommenced with an even more frightful
energy :—

' Curse her where she is. Let my curses reach her
where she is and disturb her rest.

' Curse her through the starry spaces. Lot her shadow
be accursed.

' Let my power find her even there.

' Let her hear me even there. Let her hide herself in
the blackness.

' Let her go down into the pit of despair, because I shall
one day find her.'

Again the flame fell, and again she covered her eyes
with her hajnds.

' It is no use — no use,' she wailed ; ' who can reach
those who sleep ? Not even I can reach them.'

Then once more she began her unholy rites.

' Curse her when she shall be born again. Let her be
born accursed.

' Let her be utterly accursed from the hour of her birth
until sleep finds her,

' Yea, then, let her be accm-sed : for then shall I over-
take her with my vengeance, and utterly destroy her.'

And so on. The flame rose and fell, reflecting itself in
her agonised eyes ; the hissing sound of her terrible male-
dictions, and no words of mine, especially on paper, can
convey how terrible they were, ran round the walls and
died away in little echoes, and the fierce light and deep
gloom alternated themselves on the white and dreadful
form stretched upon that bier of stone.

But at length she seemed to wear herself out, and

A SOUL IN HELL .. 165

ceased. She sat herself down upon the rocky floor, and
shook the dense cloud of her beautiful hair over her face
and breast, and began to sob terribly in the torture of a
heartrending despair.

' Two thousand years,' she moansd — ' two thousand
years have I waited and endured; but though century
doth still creep on to century, and time give place to time,
the sting of memory hath not lessened, the light of hope
doth not shine more bright. Oh ! to have lived two thou-
sand years, with my passion eating at my heart, and with
my sin ever before me. Oh, that for me life cannot bring
forgetfulness ! Oh, for the weary years that have been and
are yet to come, and evermore to come, endless and without
end !

' My love I my love ! my love ! Why did that stra,nger
bring thee back to me after this sort ? For five hundred
years I have not suffered thus. Oh, if I sinned against
thee, have I not wiped away the sin ? When wilt thou
come back to me who have all, and yet without thee have
naught? What is there that I can do ? What? What?
What? And perchance she — perchance that Egyptian
doth abide with thee where thou art, and mock my
memory. Oh, why could I not die with thee, I who slew
thee ? Alas, that I cannot die 1 Alas ! Alas ! ' and she
flung herseK prone upon the ground, and sobbed and wept
till I thought her heart must burst.

Suddenly she ceased, raised herself to her feet, re-
arranged her robe, and, tossing back her long locks impati-
ently, swept across to where the figure lay upon the stone.

' Oh Kallikrates,' she cried, and I trembled at the name,
' I must look upon thy face again, though it be agony. It
is a generation since I looked upon thee whom I slew —
slew with mine own hand,' and with trembhng fingers she
seized the corner of the sheet-like wrapping that covered
the form upon the stone bier, and then paused. When she
spoke again, it was in a kind of awed whisper, as though
her idea were terrible even to herself.

' Shall I raise thee,' she said, apparently addressing the
corpse, ' so that thou standest there before me, as of old ?

i65 SHE

I can do it,' and she held out her hands over the sheeted
dead, while her whole frame hecame rigid and terrible to
see, and her eyes grew fixed and dull. I shrank in horror
behind the curtain, my hair stood up upon my head, and
whether it was my imagination or a fact I am unable to
say, but I thought that the quiet form beneath the cover-
ing began to quiver, and the winding sheet to lift as though
it lay on the breast of one who slept. Suddenly she with-
drew her hands, and the motion of the corpse seemed to me
to cease.

' What is the use? ' she said gloomily. * Of what use
is it to recall the semblance of life when I cannot recall
the spirit ? Even if thou stoodest before me thou wouldst
not know me, and couldst but do what I bid thee. The
life in thee would be mj/ life, and not ihy life, Kallikrates.'

For a moment she stood there brooding, and then cast
herself down on her knees beside the form, and began to
press her lips against the sheet, and weep. There was some-
thmg so horrible about the sight of this awe-inspiring
woman letting loose her passion on the dead — so much
more horrible even than anything that had gone before,
that I could no longer bear to look at it, and, turning,
began to creep, shaking as I was in every limb, slowly
along the pitch-dark passage, feeUng in my trembling heart
that I had a vision of a Soul in Hell,

On I stumbled, I scarcely know how. Twice I fell,
once I turned up the bisecting passage, but fortunately
found out my mistake in time. For twenty minutes or more
I crept along, till at last it occurred to me that I must have
passed the little stair by which I descended. So, utterly
exhausted, and nearly frightened to death, I sank do^vn at
length there on the stone flooring, and sank into oblivion.

When I came to I noticed a faint ray of light in the
passage just behind me. I crept to it, and found it was
the httle stair down which the weak dawn was stealing.
Passing up it I gained my chamber in safety, and, flinging
myself on the couch, was soon lost in slumber or rather
stupor.

167

XV.

AYESHA GIVES JUDaMENT.

The next thing that I remember was opening my eyes and
perceiving the form of Job, who had now practically re-
covered from his attack of fever. He was standing in the
ray of light that pierced into the cave from the outer air,
shaking out my clothes as a makeshift for brushing them,
which he could not do because there was no brush, and
then folding them up neatly and laying them on the foot
of the stone couch. This done, he got my travelling
dressing-case out of the Gladstone bag, and opened it
ready for my use. First, he stood it on the foot of the
couch also, then, bemg afraid, I suppose, that I should
kick it off, he placed it on a leopard skin on the floor, and
stood back a step or two to observe the effect. It was not
satisfactory, so he shut up the bag, turned it on end, and,
having rested it against the foot of the couch, placed the
dressing-case on it. Next, he looked at the pots full of
water, which constituted our washiag apparatus. ' Ah ! '
I heard him murmur, ' no hot water in this beastly place.
I suppose these poor creatures only use it to boil each
other in,' and he sighed deeply.

' What is the matter. Job ? ' I said.

' Beg pardon, sir,' he said, touching his hair. ' I
thought you were asleep, sir ; and I am sure you look as
though you want it. One might think from the look of
you that you had been having a night of it.'

I only groaned by way of answer, I liad, indeed, boon
having a night of it, such as I hope never to have again.

' How is Mr. Leo, Job ? '

' Much the same, sir. If he don't soon mend, he'll
end, sir ; and that's all about it ; though I must say that

i68 SHE

that there savage, Ustane, do do her best for him, almost
like a baptised Christian. She is always hanging romid
and looking after him, and if I ventures to interfere, it's
awful to see her ; her hair seems to stand on end, and she
curses and swears away in her heathen talk — at least I
fancy she must be cursing from the look of her.'

' And what do you do then ? '

' I make her a perlite bow, and I say, " Young woman,
your position is one that I don't quite understand, and can't
recognise. Let me tell you that I has a duty to perform to
my master as is incapacitated by illness, and that I am going
to perform it until I am incapacitated too," but she don't
take no heed, not she — only curses and swears away worse
than ever. Last night she put her hand under that sort of ■
nightshirt she wears and whips out a knife with a kind
of a curl in the blade, so I whips out my revolver, and we
Avalks round and round each other till at last she bursts
out laughing. It isn't nice treatment for a Christian man
to have to put up with from a savage, however handsome
she may be, but it is what people must expect as is fools
enough ' (Job laid great emphasis on the ' fools ') ' to
come to such a place to look for things no man is meant
to find. It's a judgment on us, sir — that's my opinion ;
and I, for one, is of opinion, that the judgment isn't half
done yet, and when it is done, we shall be done too, and
just stop in these beastly caves with the ghosts and the
corpseses for once and all. And now, sir, I must be seeing
about Mr. Leo's broth, if that wild cat will let me ; and,
perhaps, you would like to get up, sir, because it's past
nine o'clock.'

Job's remarks were not of an exactly cheering order to
a man who had passed such a night as I had ; and, what
is more, they had the weight of truth. Taking one thing
with another, it appeared to me to be an utter impossibility
i that we should escape from the place where we were.
Supposing that Leo recovered, and supposing that She
; would let us go, which was exceedingly doubtful, and that
she did not ' blast ' us in some moment of vexation, and

AYESHA GIVES JUDGMENT 169

that we were not hot-potted by the Amahagger, it would
be quite impossible for us to find our way across the net-
worlc of marshes which, stretching for scores and scores of
mUes, formed a stronger and more impassable fortification
round the various Amahagger households than any that
could be built or designed by man. No, there was but
one thing to do — face it out ; and, speaking for my own
part, I was so intensely interested in the whole weird story
that, so far as I was concerned, notwithstanding the
shattered state of my nerves, I asked nothing better, even
if my life paid forfeit to my curiosity. What man for
whom physiology has charms could forbear to study such a
character as that of this Ayesha when the opportunity of
doing so presented itself ? The very terror of the pursuit
added to its fascination, and besides, as I was forced to
own to myself even now in the sober light of day, she her-
self had attractions that I could not forget. Not even the
dreadful sight which I had witnessed during the night
could drive that folly from my mind ; and alas ! that I
should have to admit it, it has not been driven thence to
this hour.

After I had dressed myself I passed into the eating, or
rather embalming chamber, and had some food, which was
as before brought to me by the girl mutes. When I had
finished I went and saw poor Leo, who was quite off his
head, and did not even know me. I asked Ustane how she
thought he was ; but she only shook her head and began
to cry a little. E^ddently her hopes were sniaU ; and I
then and there made up my mind that, if it were in any
way possible, I would get She to come and see him.
Surely she would cure him if she chose — at any rate she
said she could. While I was in the room, BUlali entered,
and also shook his head.

' He will die at night,' he said.

' God forbid, my father,' I answered, and turned av^ay
with a heavy heart.

' She-tvho-must-be-obeyed commands thy presence, my
Baboon,' said the old man as soon as we got to the

1/0 SHE

curtain ; ' but, oh my dear son, be more careful. Yester-
day I made sure in my heart that She would blast thee
when thou didst not crawl upon thy stomach before her.
She is sitting in the great hall even now to do justice upon
those who would have smitten thee and the Lion. Come
on, my son ; come swiftly.'

I turned, and followed him down the passage, and when
we reached the great central cave saw that many Ama-
hagger, some robed, and some merely clad in the sweet
simplicity of a leopard skin, were hurrying up it. We
muigled with the throng, and walked up the enormous
and, indeed, almost interminable cave. All the way its
walls were elaborately sculptured, and every twenty paces
or so passages opened out of it at right angles, leading,
Billali told me, to tombs, hoUowed in the rock by ' the
people who were before.' Nobody visited those tombs
now, he said ; and I must say that my heart rejoiced when I
thought of the opportunities of antiquarian research which
opened out before me.

At last we came to the head of the cave, where there
was a rock dais almost exactly similar to the one on which
we had been so furiously attacked, a fact that proved to
me that these dais must have been used as altars, prob-
ably for the celebration of religious ceremonies, and more
especially of rites connected with the mterment of the
dead. On either side of this dais were passages leading,
Billali informed me, to other caves full of dead bodies.
' Lideed,' he added, ' the whole mountain is full of dead,
and nearly all of them are perfect.'

In front of the dais were gathered a great number of
people of both sexes, who stood staring about in their
peculiar gloomy fashion, which would have reduced Mark
Tapley himself to misery in about five minutes, On the
dais was a rude chair of black Avood inlaid with ivory, hav-
ing a scat made of grass fibre, and a footstool formed of
a wooden slab attached to the framework of the chair.

Suddenly there was a cry of ' Hiya ! Hiya ! ' (' Sha !
She 1 '), and thereupon the entire crowd of spectators in-

AYESHA GIVES JUDGMENT 171

stantly precipitated itself upon the ground, and lay still as
though it were individually and collectively stricken dead,
leaving me standing there Hke some solitary survivor of a
massacre. As it did so a long string of guards began to
defile from a passage to the left, and ranged themselves on
either side of the dais. Then followed about a score of male
mutes, then as many women mutes bearing lamps, and then
a tall white figure, swathed from head to foot, in whom I
recognised She. herself. She mounted the dais and sat
down upon the chair, and spoke to me in Greek, I suppose
because she did not wish those present to understand what
she said.

' Come hither, oh Holly,' she said, ' and sit thou at my
feet, and see me do justice on those who would have slain
thee. Forgive me if my Greek doth halt like a lame man ;
it is so long since I have heard the sound of it that my
tongue is stiif, and will not bend rightly to the words.'

I bowed, and, mounting the dais, sat down at her feet.

' How didst thou sleep, my Holly ? ' she asked.

' I slept not well, oh Ayesha ! ' I answered with perfect
truth, and with an inward fear that perhaps she Imew how
I had passed the heart of the night.

' So,' she said, with a little laugh, ' I, too, have not
slept well. Last night I had dreams, and methinks that
thou didst call them to me, oh Holly.'

' Of what didst thou dream, Ayesha ? ' I asked in-
differently.

' I dreamed,' she answered quickly, ' of one I hate and
one I love,' and then, as though, to turn the conversation,
she addressed the captain of her guard in Arabic : ' Let
the men be brought before me.'

The captain bowed low, for the guard and her attendants
did not prostrate themselves but had remained standing,
and departed with his underlings doAvn a passage to the
right.

Then came a silence. Blic, leant her swathed head
upon her hand and appeared to be lost in thought, while
the multitude before her continued to grovel upon their

Ill SHE

stomachs, only screwing tlieir heads round a little so as to
get a view of us with one eye. It seemed that their Queen
so rarely appeared in public that they were -willing to
undergo this inconvenience, and even graver risks, to have
the opportunity of looking on her, or rather on her gar-
ments, for no living man there except myself had ever
seen her face. At last we caught sight of the waving of
lights, and heard the tramp of men coining along the
passage, and in filed the guard, and with them the sur-
vivors of our would-be murderers to the number of twenty
or more, on whose countenances the natural expression
of suUenness struggled with the terror that evidently
filled their savage hearts. They were ranged in front
of the dais, and would have cast themselves down on
the floor of the cave Uke the spectators, but Sli& stopped
them.

' Nay,' she said in her softest voice, ' stand ; I pray
you stand. Perchance the time will soon be when ye shall
grow weary of being stretched out,' and she laughed
melodiously.

I saw a cringe of terror run along the rank of the poor
doomed wretches, and, wicked villains as they were, I felt
sorry for them. Some minutes, perhaps two or three,
passed before anything fresh occurred, during which &7te
appeared from the movement of her head — for, of course,
we could not see her eyes — to be slowly and carefully ex-
amining each delinquent. At last she spoke, addressing
herself to me in a quiet and deliberate tore.

' Dost thou, oh my guest, who art known in thine own
country by the name of the Prickly Tree, recognise these
men ?'

' Ay, oh Queen, nearly all of them,' I said, and I saw
them glower at me as I said it.

' Then tell to me, and this great company, the tale
whereof I have heard.'

Thus adjured, I, in as few words as I could, related the
history of the cannibal feast, and of the attempted torture
of our poor servant. The narrative was received in perfect

A YESHA GIVES JUDGMENT 173

silence, both by tlie aceusad and by the audience, and also
by She, herself. "When I had done, Ayesha called upon
Billali by name, and, lifting his head from the ground,
but without rising, the old man confirmed my story. No
further evidence was taken.

' Ye have heard,' said S}ui at length, in a cold, clear
voice, very different from her usual tones — indeed, it was
one of the most remarkable things about this extraordinary
creature that her voice had the power of suiting itself in
a wonderful manner to the mood of the moment. ' What
have ye to say, ye rebellious children, why vengeance
should not be done upon you ? '

For some time there was no answer, but at last one
of the men, a fine, broad-chested fellow, well on in
middle-life, with deep-graven features and an eye like a
hawk's, spoke, and said that the orders that they had
received were not to harm the white men ; nothing was
said of their black servant, so, egged on thereto by a
woman who was now dead, they proceeded to try to hot-
pot him after the ancient and honourable custom of their
country, with a view of eating him in due course. As for
their attack upon ourselves, it was made in an access of
sudden fury, and they deeply regretted it. He ended by
humbly praying that mercy might be extended to them ;
or, at least, that they might be banished into the swamps,
to live or die as it might chance ; but I saw it written
on his face that he had but little hope of mercy.

Then came a pause, and the most intense silence
reigned over the whole scene, which, illuminated as it was
by the flicker of the lamps striking out broad patterns of
light and shadow upon the rocky walls, was as strange as
any I ever saw, even in that unholy land. Upon the ground
before the dais were stretched scores of the corpselike forms
of the spectators, till at last the long lines of them were lost
in the gloomy background. Before this outstretched audi-
ence v.ere the knots of evil-doers, trying to cover up their
natural terrors with a brave appearance of unconcern. On
the right and left stood the silent guards, robod in white

174 SHE

and armed with great spears and daggers, and men and
•women mutes watching with hard curious eyes. Then,
seated in her barbaric chair above them all, with myself
at her feet, was the veiled white woman, whose loveliness
and awesome power seemed to visibly shine about her like
a halo, or rather Uke the glow from some unseen light.
Never have I seen her veiled shape look more terrible than
it did in that space, while she gathered herself up for
vengeance.

At last it came.

' Dogs and serpents,' Sha began in a low voice that
gradually gathered power as she went on, till the place
rang with it. ' Eaters of human flesh, two things have
ye done. First, ye have attacked these strangers, being
white men, and would have slain their servant, and for
that alone death is your reward. But that is not all. Ye
have dared to disobey me. Did I not send my word unto
you by Billali, my servant, and the father of your house-
hold ? Did I not bid you to hospitably entertain those
strangers, whom now ye have striven to slay, and whom,
had not they been brave and strong beyond the strength of
men, ye would cruelly have murdered ? Hath it not been
taught to you from childhood that the law of She is an ever
fixed law, and that he who breaketh it by so much as one
jot or tittle shall perish ? And is not my lightest word a
law ? Have not your fathers taught you this, I say, whilst
as yet ye were but children ? Do ye not know that as
well might ye bid these great caves to fall upon you, or the
sun to cease its journeying, as to hope to turn me from
my courses, or make my word light or heavy, according to
your minds ? Well do ye know it, ye Wicked Ones. But
ye are all evil — evil to the core — the wickedness bubbles
up in you Hke a fountain in the spring-time. Were it not
for me, generations since had ye ceased to be, for of your
own evil way had ye destroyed each other. And now,
because ye have done this thing, because ye have striven
to put these men, my guests, to death, and yet more because
ye have dared to disobey my word, this is the doom that I

AYESHA GIVES JUDGMENT 175

doom you to. That ye be taken to the cave of torture,' and
given over to the tormentors, and that on the going down
of to-morrow's sun those of you who yet remain aUve be
slain, even as ye would have slain the servant of this my
guest.'

She ceased, and a faint murmur of horror ran round
the cave. As for the victims, as soon as they realised the
full hideousness of their doom, their stoicism forsook them,
and they flung themselves down upon the ground, and
wept and implored for mercy in a way that was dreadful
to behold. I, too, turned to Ayesha, and begged her
to spare them, or at least to mete out their fate in some
loss awful way. But she was hard as adamant about it.

' My Holly,' she said, again speaking in Greek, which,
to tell the truth, although I have always been considered
a better scholar of that language than most men, I found it
rather difficult to follow, chiefly because of the change in
the fall of the accent. Ayesha, of course, talked with the
accent of her contemporaries, whereas we have only tradi-
tion and the modern accent to guide us as to the exact
pronimciation — ' My Holly, it cannot be. Were I to show
mercy to those wolves, your lives would not be safe among
this people for a day. Thou knowest them not. They
are tigers to lap blood, and even now they hunger for
your Uves. How thinkest thou that I rule this people ?
I have but a regiment of guards to do my bidding, there-
fore it is not by force. It is by terror. My empire is of
the imagination. Once in a generation mayhap I do as I
have done but now, and slay a score by torture. Believe

' ' The oave of torture.' I afterwards saw this dreadful place,
also a legacy from the prehistoric people who lived in Kor. The
only objects in the cave itself were slabs of rock arranged in various
positions to facilitate the operations of the torturers. Many of these
Blabs, which were of a porous stone, were stained quite dark with
the blood of ancient victims tJiat had soaked into them. Also in the
centre of the room was a place for a furnace, with a cavity wherein to
heat the historic pot. But the most dreadful thing about the cave was
that over each slab was a sculptured illustration of the appropriate
torture being applied. ,Those sculptures were so awful that I
will not harrow the reader by attempting a description of them. —
L. H. H.

176 SHE

not tlia.t I would, be cruel, or take vengeance on anything
BO low. What can it profit me to be avenged on such as
these ? Those who live long, my Holly, have no passions,
save where they have interests. Though I may seem to
slay in wrath, or because my mood is crossed, it is not so.
Thou hast seen how in the heavens the little clouds blow
this way and that without a cause, yet behind them is the
great wind sweeping on its path whither it listeth. So is
it with me, oh HoUy. My moods and changes are the
little clouds, and fitfully these seem to turn ; but behind
them ever blows the great wind of my purpose. Nay,
the men must die ; and die as I have said.' Then,
suddenly turning to the captain of the guard —
' As my word is, so be it 1 '

177

XVI.

THE TOMBS OF k6b.

Aptee the prisoners had been removed Ayesha waved her
hand, and the spectators turned round, and began to crawl
off down the cave like a scattered flock of sheep. When
they were a fair distance from the dais, however, they rose
and walked away, leaving the Queen and myself alone, with
the exception of the mutes and the few remaining guards,
most of whom had departed with the doomed men. Think-
ing this a good opportunity, I asked She to come and see
Leo, telling her of his serious condition ; but she would
not, saying that he certainly would not die before the
night, as people never died of that sort of fever except at
nightfall or dawn. Also she said that it would be better
to let the sickness spend its course as much as possible be-
fore she cured it. Accordingly, I was rising to leave, when
she bade mo follow her, as she would talk with me, and
show me the wond^s of the caves.

I was too much involved in the web of her fatal fasci-
nations to say her no, even if 7 had wished, which I did
not. She rose from her chair, and, making some signs to
the mutes, descended from the dais. Thereon four of the
girls took lamps, and ranged themselves two in front and two
behind us, but the others went away, as also did the guards.

' Now,' she said, ' wouldst thou see some of the won-
ders of this place, oh Holly ? Look upon this great cave.
Sawest thou ever tlie like ? Yet was it, and many more
like it, hollowed by the hands of the dead race that once lived
here in the city on the plain. A great and a wonderful
people must they»have been, those men of Kor, but, like
the Egyptians, they thought more of the dead than of the

N *■

178 SHE

living. How many men, thinkest thou, working for how
many years, did it need to the hollowing out this cave and
all the galleries thereof ? '

' Tens of thousands,' I answered.

' So, oh Holly. This people was an old people before
the Egyptians were. A little can I read of their inscriptions,
having found the key thereto— and, see thou here, this was
one of the last of the caves that they hollowed,' and, turning
to the rock behind her, she motioned the mutes to hold up
the lamps. Carven over the dais was the figure of an old
man seated in a chair, witli an ivory rod in his hand. It
struck me at once that his features were exceedingly like
those of the man who was represented as being embalmed in
the chamber where we took our meals. Beneath the chair,
which, by the way was shaped exactly like the one in which
Ayeslia had sat to give judgment, was a short inscription
in the extraordinary characters of which I have already
spoken, but which I do not remember sufficient of to illus-
trate. It looked more like Chinese writing than any other
that I am acquainted with. This inscription Aycsha pro-
ceeded, with some difficulty and hesitation, to read aloud
and translate. It ran as follows : —

' In the year four thousand two hundred and fifty -nine
from the founding of the City of imperial Kor was this
cave {or burial place) completed by Tisno, King of Kor, the
people thereof and their slaves having laboured thereat for
three generations, to be a tomb for their citizens of ranJc
who shall come after. May the blessing of the heaven
above the heaven rest itpon their icorh, and make the sleep
of Tisno, the mighty monarch, the likeness of ivhose
features is graven above, a sound and happy sleep till the
day of atuakening,^ and also the sleep) of his servants, and
of those of his race ichq, rising up after him, shall yet lay
their heads as lotv.'

' Thou seest, oh Holly,' she said, ' this people founded
the city, of which the ruins yet cumber the plain yonder,

' This phrase is remariaUe, as seeming to indicate a belief in a
future state. — Editok.

THE TOMBS OF KOR 179

four thousand years before this cave was finished. Yet,
when first mine eyes beheld it two thousand years ago,
was it even as it is now. Judge, therefore, how old must
that city have been ! And now, follow thou me, and I
will show thee after what fashion this great people fell
when the time was come for it to fall,' and she led the way
down to the centre of the cave, stopping at a spot where a
round rock had been let into a kind of large manhole in
the flooring, accurately fiUing it just as the iron plates fill
the spaces in the London pavements down which the coals
are thrown. ' Thou seest,' she said. ' Tell me, what is it ? '

' Nay, I know not,' I answered ; whereon she crossed
to the left-hand side of the cave (looking towards the
entrance) and signed to the mutes to hold up the lamps.
On the wall was something painted with a red pigment
in similar characters to those hewn beneath the sculpture
of Tisno, King of Kor. This inscription she proceeded to
translate to me, the pigment still being quite fresh enough
to show the form of the letters. It ran as follows : —

'J, Junis, a liricst of the Great Tcmi^lo of Kor, write
this upon the rock of the hiirying -place in the year four
thousand eight hundred and three from the founding ofKur.
Kor is fallen ! No more shall the mighti/ feast in her halls,
no more shall she rule the world, and Tier navies go out to
commerce with the world. Kor is fallen ! and her mighlij
works and all the cities of Kor, and all the harhours that
she built and the canals that she made, are for the wolf
and the oivl and the ivild swan, and the barbarian who
comes after. Twenty and five moons ago did a cloud settle
upon Kur, and the hundred cities of Kor, and out of the
cloud came a pestilence that sleio her people, old and
young, one loith another, and spared not. One luith
another they turned black and died — ilie young and the old,
the rich and the poor, the man and the woman, the prince
and the slave. The pestilence slew and slew, and ceased
not by day or by night, and those who escaped from the
pestilence were slain of the famine. No longer could the
bodies of the children of Kor be preserved according to the

K 2

iTo SHE

ancient rites, because of the nuinher of the dead, therefore
were they hurled into the great pit beneath the came through
the hole in the floor of the cave. Then at last, a remnant
of this the great people, the light of the whole world, went
down to the coast and took ship and sailed northwards ;
and now am I, the Priest Junis, who write this, the last
man left alive of this great city of men, but luhether there
be any yet left in the other cities I know not. This do I
write in misery of heart before I die, because K6r the Im-
perial is no more, and because there are none to worship
in her temple, and all her palaces are empity, and her
princes and her captains and her traders and her fair
women have passed off the face of the earth.'

I gave a sigh of astonishment — the utter desolation
depicted in this rude scrawl was so overpowering. It was
terrible to think of this solitary survivor of a mighty people
recording its fate before he too went down into darkness.
What must the old man have felt as, in ghastly terrifj-ing
solitude, by the light of one lamp feebly illumining a little
space of gloom, he in a few brief lines daubed the history
of his nation's death upon the cavern wall ? What a sub-
ject for the moralist, or the painter, or indeed for any one
who can think !

'Doth it not occur to thee, oh Holly,' said Ayesha,
laying her hand upon my shoulder, ' that those men who
sailed North may have been the fathers of the first Egyp-
tians ? '

' Nay, I know not,' I said ; ' it seems that the world is
very old.'

' Old ? Yes, it is old indeed. Time after time have
nations, ay, and rich and strong nations, learned in the
arts, been and passed away and been forgotten, so that no
memory of them remains. This is but one of several ; for
Time eats up the works of man, unless, indeed, he digs in
caves like the people of Kor, and then mayhap the sea swal-
lows them, or the earthquake shakes them in. Who knows
what hath been on the earth, or what shall be ? There is
no new thing under the sun, as the wise Hebrew wrote

THE rOMBS^ OF k6r i3i

long ago. Yet were not these people utterly destroyed, as
I tliink. Some few remained in the other cities, for their
cities were many. But the barbarians from the south, or
perchance my people, the Arabs, came down upon them, and
took their women to wife, and the race of the Amahagger
that is now is a bastard brood of the mighty sons of Kor,
and behold it dweUeth in the tombs with its fathers' bones.'
But I know not : who can know ? My arts cannot pierce so
far into the blackness of Time's night. A great people were
they. They conquered tiU none were left to conquer, and
then they dwelt at ease within their rocky mountain walls,
with their man servants and their maid servants, their min-
strels, their sculptors, and their concubines, and traded and
quarrelled, and ate and hunted and slept and made morry
tiU their time came. But come, I will show thee the great
pit beneath the cave whereof the writing speaks. Never
shall thine eyes witness such another sight.'

Accordingly I followed her to a side passage opening out
of the main cave, then down a great munber of steps, and
along an underground shaft which cannot have been less
than sixty feet beneath the surface of the rock, and was
ventilated by curious borings that ran upward, I do not
know where. Suddenly the passage ended, and she halted
and bade the mutes hold up the lamps, and, as she had pro-
phesied, I saw a scene such as I was not likely to see again.
We were standing in an enormous pit, or rather on the edge
of it, for it went down deeper — I do not know how much —
than the level on which we stood, and was edged in with a
low wall of rock. So far as I could judge, this pit was about
the size of the space beneath the dome of St. Paul's in Lon-
don, and when the lamps were held up I saw that it was no-
thing but one vast charnel-house, being literally full of thou-
sands of human skeletons, which lay piled up in an enor-
mous gleaming pyramid, formed by the slipping down of

' The name of the race Ama-hagger would seem to indicate a
curious mingling of races such as might easily have occurred in the
neighbourhood of the Zambesi. The prefix ' Ama ' is common to the
Znfu and kindred races, and signifies ' people,' ^Yhile ' hagger ' is aq
4ra,big \Yord n;caning a stone,— EiiiToii.

l82 SHE

tlie bodies at the apex as frtsli cues were cTroppcd in from
above. Anything more appalling than this jmnbled mass
of the remains of a departed race I cannot imagine, and what
made it even more dreadful was that in this dry air a con-
siderable number of the bodies had simply become desiccated
with the skin still on them, and now, fixed in every con-
ceivable position, stared at us out of the mountain of white
bones, grotesquely horrible caricatures of humanity. In my
astonishment I uttered an ejaculation, and the echoes of my
voice ringing in the vaulted space disturbed a skull that had
been accurately balanced for many thousands of years near
the apex of the pile. Down it came with a run, bounding
along merrily towards us, and of course bringing an ava-
lanche of other bones after it, till at last the whole pit
rattled with their movement, even as though the skeletons
were getting up to greet us.

' Come,' I said, ' I have seen enough. These are the
bodies of these who died of the great sickness, is it not
BO ? ' I added, as we turned away.

' Yes. The people of Kor ever embalmed their dead,
as did the Egyptians, but their art v/as greater than the
art of the Egyptians, for whereas the Egyptians disem-
bowelled and drcAV the brain, the people of Kor injected
fluid into the veins, and thus reached every part. But
stay, thou shalt sec,' and she halted at haphazard at one
of the little doorways opening out of the passage along
which we were walking, and motioned to the mutes to light
us in. We entered into a small chamber similar to the one
in which I had slept at our first stopping-place, only instead
of one there were two stone benches or beds in it. On the
benches lay figures covered with yellow linen,' on which a
fine and impalpable dust had gathered in the course of
nges but nothing like to the extent that one would have an-
ticipated, for in these deep-hewn caves there is no material

' All tlie linen that tlie Amahagger -wore \vas taken from the
tombs, which accounted for its yellow hue. It it was well washed,
however, and properly reblcached, it acquired its former snowy white-
ness, and was the soi'tesl and best linen I ever saw.— L. H. H.

THE TOMBS OF k6r 183

to turn to dust. About the bodies on the stone shelves
and floor of the tomb were many painted vases, but I saw
very few ornaments or weapons in any of the vaults.

' Uplift the cloths, oh Holly,' said Ayesha, but when I
put out my hand to do so I drew it back again. It seemed
like sacrilege, and to speak the truth I was awed by the
dread solemnity of the place, and of the presences before
us. Then, with a little laugh at my fears, she drew them
herself, only to discover other and yet finer cloths lying over
the forms upon the stone bench. These also she withdrew,
and then for the first time for thousands upon thousands
of years did living eyes look upon the face of that chilly
dead. It was a woman ; she might have been thirty-
five years of age, or perhaps a little less, and had certainly
been beautiful. Even now her calm clear-cut features,
marked out with delicate eyebrows and long eyelashes which
threw little lines of the shadow of the lampUght upon the
ivory face, were wonderfully beautiful. There, robed in
white, down ivhich her blue-black hair was streaming, she
slept her last long sleep, and on her arm, its face pressed
against her breast, there lay a little babe. So sweet was
the sight, although so awfal, that — I confess it without
shame — I could scarcely withhold my tears. It took me
back across the dim gulf of the ages to some happy home
in dead Imperial Kor, where this v^'insome lady girt about
with beauty had lived and died, and dying taken her last-
born with her to the tomb. There they were before us,
mother and babe,.the whitememoriesof a forgotten human
history speaking more eloquently to the heart than could
any written record of their lives. Eeverently I replaced the
grave-cloths, and, with a sigh that flowers so fair should,
in the purpose of the Everlasting, have only bloomed to
be gathered to the grave, I turned to the body on the op-
posite shelf, and gently unveiled it. It was that of a man
in advanced life, with a long grizzled beard, and also
robed in white, probably the husband of the lady who,
after surviving her many years, came at last to sleep once
more for good and all beside her.

1 84 SHE

We left tlie place and entered otLers. It would be too
long to describe the many things I saw in them. Each
onB had its occupants, for the five hundred and odd years
that had elapsed between the completion of the cave and
the destruction of the race had evidently sufficed to fill
these catacombs, numberless as they were, and all ap-
peared to have been undisturbed since the day when they
were placed there. I could fill a book with the description
of them, but to do so would only be to repeat what I have
said, with variations.

Nearly all the bodies, so masterly was the art with
which they had been treated, were as perfect as on the day
of death thousands of years before. Nothing came to injure
them in the deep silence of the living rock : they were
beyond the reach of heat and cold and damp, and the aro-
matic drugs with which they had been saturated were
evidently practically everlasting in their effect. Here and
there, however, we saw an exception, and in these cases,
although the flesh looked sound enough externally, if one
touched it it fell in, and revealed the fact that the figure
was but a pile of dust. This arose, Ayesha told me, from
these particular bodies having, either owing to haste in the
burial or other causes, been soaked in the preservative,'
instead of its being injected into the substance of the
flesh.

About the last tomb we visited I must, however, say

' Ayesha afterwards showed me the tree from the leaves of which
this ancient preservative was manufactured. It isa low bush-like
tree, that to this day grows in wonderful ijlenty upon the sides of
the mountains, or rather upon the slopes leading up to the rooky
walls. The leaves are long and narrow, a vivid green in colour, but
turning a bright red in the autumn, and not unlike those of a laurel
in general appearance. They have little smell when green, but if
boiled the aromatic odour from them is so strong that one can hardly
bear it. The best mixture, however, was made from the roots, and
among the people of K6r there was a law, which Ayesha showed me
alluded to on some of the inscriptions, to the effect that under heavy
iienalties no one under a certain rank was to be embalmed with the
drugs prepared from the roots. The object and effect of this was, of
course, to preserve the trees from extermination. The sale of the
leaves and roots was a Government monopoly, and from it the Kings
of Kor derived a large proportion of their private revenue. — L. H. 11.

THE TOMBS OF k6r 185

one wordj for its contents spoke even more eloquently to
the human sympathies than those of the first. It had
but two occupants, and they lay together on a single shelf.
I withdrew the grave-cloths, and there, clasped heart to
heart, were a young man and a blooming girl. Her head
rested on his arm, and his lips were pressed against her
brow. I opened the man's linen robe, and there over his
heart was a dagger-wound, and beneath the girl's fair
breast was a like cruel stab, through which her Ufe had
ebbed away. On the rock above was an inscription in three
words. Ayesha translated it. It was ' WeMcd in Death.''
What was the Hfe-history of these two, who, of a truth,
were beautiful in their lives, and in their death were not
divided ?

I closed my eyelids, and imagination taking up the
thread of thought shot its swift shuttle back across the
ages, weaving a picture on their blackness so real and vivid
in its detail that I could almost for a moment think that I
had triumphed o'er the Past, and that my spirit's eyes had
pierced the mystery of Time.

I seemed to see this fair girl form — the yellow hair
stroammg down her, glitteriug against her garments snowy
white, and the bosom that was whiter than the robes, even
dimming with its lustre her ornaments of burnished gold.
I seemed to see the great cave filled with warriors, bearded
and clad in maU, and, on the lighted dais where Ayeslia
had given judgment, a man standing, robed, and surromided
by the symbols of his priestly office. And up the cave
there came one clad in purple, and before him and behind
him came minstrels and fair maidens, chanting a wedding
song. White stood the maid against the altar, fairer than
tlie fairest there — purer than a lily, and more cold than
the dew that glistens in its heart. But as the man drew
near she shuddered. Then out of the press and throng
there sprang a dark-haired youth, and put his arm about
this long-forgotten maid, and kissed her pale face in
which the blood shot up like lights of the red dawn
across the silent skv. And next there was turmoil and

1 86 SHE

uproar, and a flashing of swords, and tlicy tore the youth
from her arms, and stabbed him, but with a cry she
snatched tlie dagger from his belt, and drove it into her
snowy breast, home to the heart, and down she fell, and
then, with cries and wailing, and every sound of lamenta-
tion, the pageant rolled away from the arena of my vision,
and once more the past shut to its book.

Let him who reads forgive the intrusion of a dream
into a history of fact. But it came so hoine to mc — I sav/
it all so clear in a moment, as it v/ere ; and, besides, who
shall say what proportion of fact, past, present, or to come,
may lie in the imagination ? What is imagination ? Per-
haps it is the shadow of the intangible truth, perhaps it
is the soul's thought.

Ill an instant the whole thing had passed through my
brain, and S}ie, was addressing me.

' Behold the lot of man,' said the veiled Ayesha, as she
drew the winding sheets back over the dead lovers, speaking
in a solemn, thrilling voice, which accorded well with the
dream that I had dreamed : ' to the tomb, and to the forget-
fulness that hides the tomb, must we aU come at last !
Ay, even I who live so long. Even for me, oh Holly,
thousands upon thousands of years hence ; thousands of
years after thou hast gone through the gate and been lost
in the mists, a day will dawn whereon I shall die, and be
even as thou art and these are. And then what will it
avail that I have lived a little longer, holding off death
by the knowledge I have wrung from Nature, since at last
I too must die ? What is a span of ten thousand years,
or ton times ten thousand years, in the history of time ?
It is as naught — it is as the mists that roll up in the sun-
light ; it fleeth away like an hour of sleep or a breath of
the Eternal Spirit. Behold the lot of man ! Certainly it
shall overtake us, and we shall sleep. Certainly, too, we
shall awake, and live again and again shall sleep, and so
on and on, through periods, spaces, and times, from feon
unto EBon, till the world is dead, and the worlds beyond
the world are dead, and naught liveth save the Spirit

THE TOMBS OF k6r 187

that is Life. But for us twain and for these dead ones
shall the end of ends be Life, or shall it be Death ? As
3"et Death is but Life's Night, but out of the night is the
Morrow born again, and doth again beget the Night. Only
when Day and Night, and Life and Death, are ended
and swallowed up in that from which they came, what
shall be our fate, oh Holly ? Who can see so far ? Not
oven I ! '

And then, with a sudden change of tone and manner —
' Hast thou seen enough, my stranger guest, or shall I
show thee more of the wonders of these tombs that arc
my palace halls ?. If thou wilt, I can lead thee to where
Tisno, the mightiest and most valorous King of Kor, in
whose day these caves were ended, lies in a pomp that
seems to mock at nothingness, and bid the empty shadows
of the past do homage to his sculptured vanity ! ' •

'I have seen enough, oh Queen,' I answered. 'My
heart is overwhelmed by the power of the present Death.
Mortahty is weak, and easily broken down by a sense of
the companionship that waits upon its end. Take me
hence, oh Ayesha ! '

1 88 SHE

XVII.

THE BALANCE TUENS.

In a few minutes, following the lamps of tlio mutes, which,
held out from the body as a bearer holds water in a vessel,
had the appearance of floating down the darkness by them-
selves, we came to a stair which led us to She's ante-room,
the same that Billali had crept up upon all fours on the
previous day. Here I would have bid the Queen adieu,
but she would not.

' Nay,' she said, ' enter with me, oh Holly, for of a
truth thy conversation pleaseth me. Think, oh Holly :
for two thousand years have I had none to converse with
save slaves and my own thoughts, and though of all this
thinking hath much wisdom come, and many secrets been
made plain, yet am I weary of my thoughts, and have
come to loathe mine own society, for surely the food that
memory gives to eat is bitter to the taste, and it is only
with the teeth of hope that we can bear to bite it. Now
though thy thoughts are green and tender, as becometh
one so young, yet are they those of a thmking bram, and
in truth thou dost bring back to my mind certain of those
old philosophers with whom in days bygone I have disputed
at Athens, and at Becca in Arabia, for thou hast the same
crabbed air and dusty look, as though thou hadst passed
thy days in reading ill- writ Greek, and been stained dark
with the grime of manuscripts. So draw the curtain, and
sit here by my side, and we will eat fruit, and talk of
pleasant things. See, I will again unveil to thee. Thou
hast brought it on thyself, oh Holly ; fairly have I warned
thee — and thou slialt call me beautiful as even those old

THE BALAA'CE TURNS iSg

philosophers were wont to do. Pie upon them, forgetting
their philosophy ! '

And without more ado she stood up and shook the
white wrappings from her, and came forth shining and
splendid hke some ghttering snake when she has cast her
slough ; ay, and fixed her wonderful eyes upon me — more
deadly than any Basilisk's — and pierced me through and
through with their heauty, and sent her light laugh ring,
iug through the air like chimes of silver bells.

A new mood was on her, and the very colour of her
mind seemed to change beneath it. It was no longer
torture-torn and hateful, as I had seen it when she was
cursing her dead rival by the leaping flames, no longer
icily terrible as in the judgment-hall, no longer rich,
and sombre, and splendid, like a Tyrian cloth, as in the
dwellings of the dead. No, her mood now was that of
Aphrodite triumphing. Life — radiant, ecstatic, wonderful
— seemed to flow from her and around her. Softly she
laughed and sighed, and swift her glances flew. She
shook her heavy tresses, and their perfume filled the place ;
she struck her httle sandalled foot upon the floor, and
hummed a snatch of some old Greek epithalamium. All
the majesty was gone, or did but lurk and faintly flicker
through her laughing eyes, like lightning seen through
sunlight. She had cast off the terror of the leaping flame,
the cold power of judgment that was even now being done,
and the wise sadness of the tombs — cast them off and put
them behind her, like the white shroud she wore, and now
stood out the incarnation of lovely tempting womanhood,
made more perfect — and in a way more spiritual — than
ever woman was before.

' There, my Holly, sit there where thou canst see me.
It is by thine own wish, remember — again I say, blame me
not if thou dost spend the rest of thy little span with such
a sick pain at the heart that thou wouldst fain have died
before ever thy curious eyes were set upon me. There, sit
so, and tell me, for in truth I am inclined for praises — tell
me, am I not beautiful ? Nay, speak not so hastily ; con-

I go SHE

. Bidcr well the point ; take me feature by feature, forgetting
not my form, ancl my hands and feet, and my hair, and the
^\hiteness of my skin, and then tell me truly hast thou
ever known a woman who in aught, ay, in one httle portion
of her beauty, in the curve of an eyelash even, or the
modelling of a shell-like ear, is justified to hold a Hght
before my loveliness ? Now, my waist ! Perchance thou
thinkest it too large, hut of a truth it is not so ; it is this
golclcn snake that is too large, and doth not bind it as it
should. It is a wise snake, and knoweth that it is ill to
tie in the waist. But see, give me thy hands — so — ^now
press them round me, there, with but a little force, thy
fingers touch, oh Holly.'

I could bear it no longer. I am but a man, and she
was more than a woman. Heaven laiows what she was —
I do not ! But then and there I fell upon my knees before
her, and told her in a sad mixture of languages — for such
moments confuse the thoughts — that I worshipped her as
never woman was worshipped, and that I would give my
immortal soul to marry her, which ait that time I certainly
Avould have done, and so, indeed, would any other man, or
all the race of men rolled into one. For a moment she
looked a little surprised, and then she began to laugh, and
clap her hands in glee.

' Oh, so soon, oh Holly ! ' she said. ' I wondered how
many minutes it would need to bring thee to thy knees. I
have not seen a man kneel before me for so many days,
and, believe me, to a woman's heart the sight is sweet, ay,
wisdom and length of days take not from that dear pleasure
which is our sex's only right.

' What wouldst thou ? — what wouldst thou ? Thou dost
not know what thou doest. Have I not told thee that I am
not for thee ? I love but one, and thou art not the man. Ah
Holly, for all thy wisdom — and in a way thou art wise —
thou art but a fool running after folly. Thou wouldst look
into mine eyes — thou wouldst kiss me ! Well, if it pleaseth
thee, look,' and she bent herself towards me, and fixed her
dark and thrilling orbs upcn my own ; ' ay, and kiss too,

THE BALANCE TURNS 191

if thou wilt, for, thanks hs given to the scheme of things,
lasses leave no marks, except upon the heart. But if thou
dost kiss, I tell thee of a surety wilt thou eat out thy breast
with love of me, and die ! ' and she bent yet further towards
me till her soft hair brushed my brow, and her fragrant
breath played upon my face, and made me faint and weak.
Then of a sudden, even as I stretched out my arms to clasp,
she straightened herself, and a quick change passed over
her. Beaching out her hand, she hold it over my head,
and it seemed to me that something flowed from it that
chilled me back to common sense, and a knowledge of
propriety and the domestic virtues.

' Enough of this wanton play,' she said with a touch
of sternness. ' Listen, Holly. Thou art a good and
honest man, and I fain would spare thee ; but, oh ! it is
so hard for a woman to be merciful. I have said I am
not for thee, therefore let thy thoughts pass by mo like
an idle wind, and the dust of thy imagination sink again
into the depths — well, of despair, if thou wilt. Thou dost
not know me. Holly. Hadst thou seen me but ten hours
past when my passion seized me, thou hadst shrunk from
me in fear and trembling. I am a woman of many moods,
and, like the water in that vessel, I reflect many things ;
but they pass, my Holly; they pass, and are forgotten.
Only the water is the water still, and I still am I, and that
which maketh the water maketh it, and that which maketli
me maketh me, nor can my quality be altered. Therefore,
pay no heed to what I seem, seeing that thou canst not
know what I am. If thou troublest me again I will veil
myself, and thou shalt behold my face no more.'

I rose, and sank on the cushioned couch beside her,
yet quivering with emotion, though for a moment my mad
passion had left me, as the leaves of a tree quiver still,
although the gust be gone that stirred them. I did not
dare to tell her that I had seen her in that deep and hellish
mood, muttering incantations to the fire in the tomb.

' So,' she went on, ' now eat some fruit ; believe me, it
is the only true food for man. Oh, tell me of the philo-

193 SHE

sophy of that Hebrew Messiah, who came after me, and
whom thou sayest doth now rule Eome, and Greece, and
Egypt, and the barbarians beyond. It must have been a
strange philosophy that He taught, for in my clay the
peoples would have naught of our philosophies. Ecvel and
lust and drink, blood and cold steel, and the shook of men
gathered in the battle — these were the canons of their
creeds.'

I had recovered myself a little by now, and, feeling
bitterly ashamed of the weakness into which I had been
betrayed, I did my best to expound to her the doctrines of
Christianity, to which, however, with the single exception
of our conception of Heaven and Hell, I found that she
paid but faint attention, her interest being all directed
towards the Man who taught them. Also I told her that
among her own people, the Arabs, another prophet, ono
Mohammed, had arisen and preached a new faith to which
many milhons of manldnd now adhered.

' Ah ! ' she said ; ' I see — two new rehgions 1 I have
known so many, and doubtless there have been many more
since I knew aught beyond these caves of Kor. Mankind
asks ever of the sides to vision out what lies behind them.
It is terror for the end, and but a subtler form of selfishness
— this it is that breeds religions. Mark, my Holly, each
religion claims the future for its followers ; or, at the least,
the good thereof. The evil is for those benighted ones who
will have none of it ; seeing the light the true believers
worship, as the fishes see the stars, but dimly. The reh-
gions come and the religions pass, and the civihsations come
and pass, and naught endures but the world and human
nature. Ah ! if man would but see that hope is fi'om within
and not from without — that he himself must work out his
own salvation ! He is there, and withm him is the breath
of life and a knowledge of good and evil as good and evil is
to him. Thereon let him build and stand erect, and not
cast himself before the image of some unknown God,
modelled like his poor self, but with a bigger brain to think
the evil thing ; and a longer arm to do it.'

THE BALANCE TURNS 193

I thought to myself, which shows how old such reason-
ing is, being, indeed, one of the recurring quantities of
theological discussion, that her argument sounded very hke
some that I have heard in the nineteenth century, and in
other places than the caves of K6r, and with which, by the
way, I totally disagree, but I did not care to try and discuss
the question with her. To begin with, my mind was too
weary with all the emotions through which I had passed,
and, in the second place, I knew that I should get the worst
of it. It is weary work enough to argue with an ordinary
materialist, who hurls statistics and whole strata of geolo-
gical facts at your head, whilst you can only buffet him with
deductions and instincts and the snowflakes of faith, that
are, alas 1 so apt to melt in the hot ember^ of our troubles.
How little chance, then, should I have against one whose
brain was supernaturaUy sharpened, and who had two
thousand years of experience, besides all manner of know-
ledge of the secrets of Nature at her command 1 Feeling
that she would be more likely to convert me than I should
to convert her, I thought it best to leave the matter alone,
and so sat silent. Many a time since then have I bitterly
regretted that I did so, for thereby I lost the only opportu-
nity I can remember having had of ascertaining what
Ayesha really believed, and what her ' philosophy ' was.

' WeU, my Holly,' she continued, ' and so those people
of mine have also found a prophet, a false prophet thou
sayest, for he is not thine own, and, indeed, I doubt it not.
Yet in my day was it otherwise, for then we Arabs had
many gods. Allat there was, and Saba, the Host of Heaven,
Al Uzza, and Manah the stony one, for whom the blood of
victims flowed, and Wadd and Saw^, and Yaghuth the Lion
of the dwellers in Yaman, and Yauk the Horse of Morad,
and Nasr the Eagle of Hamyar ; ay, and many more. Oh,
the folly of it all, the shame and the pitifal foUy I Yet
when I rose in wisdom and spoke thereof, surely they would
have slain me in the name of their outraged gods. Well,
so hath it ever been ; — ^but, my Holly, art thou weary of me
already, that thou dost sit so silent ? Or dost thou fear lest

194 . SHE

I should teaeLi thee my philosophy ? — for Imow I have a
philosophy. What would a teacher be without her own
philosophy ? and if thou dost vex me overmuch beware I
for I will have thee learn it, and thou shalt be my disciple,
and we twain will found a faith that shall swallow up all
others. Faithless man ! And but half an hour since thou
wast upon thy knees — the posture does not suit thee, HoUy
— swearing that thou didst love me. What shall we do ? —
Nay, I have it. I will come and see this youth, the Lion,
as the old man Billah calls him, who came with thee, and
who is so sick. The fever must have run its course by
now, and if he is about to die I will recover him. Fear
not, my Holly, I shall use no magic. Have I not told thee
that there is no such thing as magic, though there is such
a thing as understanding and applying the forces which
are in Nature ? Go now, and presently when I have made
the drug ready I wiU follow thee.' '

Accordingly I went, only to find Job and Ustane in a
great state of grief, declaring that Leo was in the throes
of death, and that they had been searching for me every-
where. I rushed to the couch, and glanced at him : clearly
he was dying. He was senseless, and breathing heavily,
but his lips were quivering, and every now and again
a little shudder ran down his' frame. I knew enough of^
doctoring to see that in another hour he would be beyond
the reach of earthly help — ^perhaps in another five minutes.
How I cursed my selfishness and the folly that had kept
me lingering by Ayesha's side while my dear boy lay
dying 1 Alas and alas ! how easily the best of us are
lighted down to evil by the gleam of a woman's eyes ! What
a wicked wretch was I ! Actually, for the last half-hour I
had scarcely thought of Leo, and this, be it remembered,
of the man who for twenty years had been my dearest

• Ayesha was a great chemist, indeed chemiBtry appears to have
been her only amusement and occupation. She had one of the caves
fitted up as a laboratory, and, although her appliances were neces-
sarily rude, the results that she attained were, as will become clear
in the course of this narrative, sufficiently surprising. — ^L. H. H.

THE BALANCE TURNS 195

companion, and the chief interest of my existence. And
now, perhaps, it was too late !

I wrmig my hands, and glanced round. Ustane was sit-
ting by the couch, and in her eyes burnt the duU light of
despair. Job was blubbering — I am sorry I cannot name
his distress by any more delicate word — audibly in the
corner. Seeing my eye fixed upon him he went outside to
give way to his grief in the passage. Obviously the only
hope lay in Ayesha. She, and she alone — unless, indeed,
she was an impostor, which I could not believe — could save
him. I would go and implore her to come. As I started
to do so, however. Job came flying into the room, his hair
literally standing on end with terror.

' Oh, God help us, sir ! ' he ejaculated in a frightened
whisper, ' here's a corpse a-coming sliding down the pas-

Por a: moment I was puzzled, but presently, of course,
it struck me that he must have seen Ayesha, wrapped in
her grave-like garment, and been deceived by the extra-
ordinary undulating smoothness of her walk into a belief
that she was a white ghost ghding towards him. Indeed,
at' that very moment the question was settled, for Ayesha
herself was in the apartment, or rather cave. Job turned,
and saw her sheeted form, and then, with a convulsive
howl of ' Here it comes ! ' sprang into a corner, and jammed
his face against the wall, and Ustane, guessing whose the
dread presence must be, prostrated herself upon her face.

' Thou comest in a good time, Ayesha,' I said, 'for my
boy lies at the point of death.'

' So,' she said softly ; ' provided he be not dead, it is
no matter, for I can bring him back to life, my Holly. Is
that man there thy servant, and is that the method where-
with thy servants greet strangers in thy country ? '
' ' He is frightened of thy garb — it hath a death-like air,'
I answered.

She laughed.

' And the girl ? Ah, I see now. It is her of whom
thou didst speak to me. Well, bid them both to leave us,

o2

igS . SHE

and we will see to this sick Lion of thine. I love not that
underlings should perceive my wisdom.'

Thereon I told Ustane in Arabic and Job in English
b )th to leave the room ; an order which the latter obeyed
readily enough, and was glad to obey, for he could not
in any way subdue his fear. But it was otherwise with
Ustane.

' What does She want ? ' she whispered, divided be-
tween her fear of the terrible Queen and her anxiety to
remained near Leo. ' It is surely the right of a wife to be
near her husband when he dieth. Nay, I will not go, my
lord, the Baboon.'

' Why doth not that woman leave us, my Holly ? '
asked Ayesha, from the other end of the cave, where she
was engaged in carelessly examining some of the sculptures
on the wall.

' She is not willing to leave Leo,' I answered, not
knowing what to say. Ayesha wheeled round, and, point-
ing to the girl Ustane, said one word, and one only, but it
was quite enough, for the tone in which it was said meant
volumes.

'Go!'

And then Ustane crept past her on her hands and
knees, and went.

' Thou seest, my Holly,' said Ayesha, with a little
laugl^i, ' it was needful that I should give these people a
lesson in obedience. That girl went nigh to disobeying
me, but then she did not learn this morn how I treat the
disobedient. Well, she has gone ; and now let me see the
youth,' and she glided towards the couch on which Leo lay,
with his face in the shadow and turned toward the wall.

' He hath a noble shape,' she said, as she bent over him
to look upon his face.

Next second her tail and willowy form was staggering
back across the room, as though she had been shot or
stabbed, staggering back tiU at last she struck the cavern
wall, and then there burst from her lips the most awful
and unearthly scream that I ever heard in all my life.

THE BALANCE TURNS 197

' What is it, Ayesha ? ' I cried. ' Is he dead ? '

She turned, and sprang towards me like a tigress.

' Thou dog ! ' she said, in her terrible whisper, which
sounded like the hiss of a snake, ' why didst thou hide
this from me ? ' And she stretched out her arm, and I
thought that she was about to slay me.

' What ? ' I ejaculated, in the most lively terror ;
• what ? '

' Ah ! ' she said, ' perchance thou didst not know.
Learn, my HoUy, learn: there Ues — there lies my lost
EalUkrates. Kallikrates, who has come back to me at last,
as I knew he would, as I knew he would ; ' and she began to
sob and to laugh, and generally to conduct herself like any
other lady who is a little upset, murmuring ' Kallikrates,
Kallikrates ! '

' Nonsense,' thought I to myself, but I did not like
to say it ; and, indeed, at that moment I was thinking of
Leo's life, having forgotten everything else ia that terrible
anxiety. "What I feared now was that he should die
while she was ' carrying on.'

' Unless thou art able to help him, Ayesha,' I put in,
by way of a reminder, ' thy KaUikrates will soon be far
beyond thy calling. Surely he dieth even now.'

' True,' she said, with a start. ' Oh, why did I not
come before I I am mmerved — my hand trembles, even
mine — and yet it is very easy. Here, thou Holly, take this
phial,' and she produced a tiny jar of pottery from the
folds of her garment, ' and pour the liquid in it down his
throat. It will cure him if he be not dead. Swift, now !
Swift ! The man dies ! '

I glanced towards him ; it was true enough, Leo was in
his death-struggle. I saw his poor face turning ashen, and
heard the breath begin to rattle in his throat. The phial
was stoppered with a little piece of wood. I drew it with
my teeth, and a drop of the fluid within flew out upon my
tongue. It had a sweet flavour, and for a second made my
head swim, and a mist gather before my eyes, but happily
the effect passed away as swiftly as it had arisen,

198 SHE

When I readied Leo's side lie was plainly expiring —
his golden head was slowly turning from side to side, and
his nioTith was slightly open. I called to Ayesha to hold
his head, and this she managed to do, though the woman
was quivering from head to foot, Hke an aspen-leaf or a
startled horse. Then, forcing the jaw a Httle more open,
I poured the contents of the phial into his mouth.
Instantly a Httle vapour arose from it, as happens when
one disturbs nitric acid, and this sight did not increase
my hopes, already faint enough, of the efficacy of the
treatment.

One thing, however, was certain, the death-throes
ceased — at first I thought because he had got beyond them,
and crossed the awful river. His face turned to a livid
paUor, and his heart-beats, which had been feeble enough
before, seemed to die away altogether — only the eyeHd still
twitched a httle. In my doubt I looked up at. Ayesha,
whose head- wrapping had slipped back in her excitement
when she went reehng across the room. She was still
holding Leo's head, and, with a face as pale as his own,
watching his countenance with such an expression of
agonised anxiety as I have never seen before. Clearly she
did not know if he would live or die. Five minutes slowly
passed, and I saw that she was abandoning hope ; her
lovely oval face seemed to fall in and grow visibly thinner
beneath the pressure of a mental agony whose pencil drew
black hnes about the hollows of her eyes. The coral faded
even from her lips, till they were as white as Leo's face,
and quivered pitifully. It was shocking to see her : even
in my own grief I felt for hers.

' Is it too late ? ' I gasped.

She hid her face in her hands, and made no answer,
and I too turned away. But as I did so I heard a deep-
drawn breath, and looking down perceived a line of colour
creeping up Leo*s face, then another and another, and
then, wonder of wonders, the man we had thought dead
turned over on his side.

' Thou seestj' I said in a whisper.

THE BALANCE TURNS 199

* I see,' she answered hoarsely. ' He is saved. I
thought we were too late — another moment — one little
moment more — and he had been gone ! ' and she burst
into an awful flood of tears, sobbing as though her heart
would break, and yet looking lovelier than ever as she did
it. At last she ceased.

' Forgive me, my Holly — forgive me for my weakness,'
she said. ' Thou seest after all I am a very woman.
Think — ^now think of it ! This morning didst thou speak
of the place of torment appointed by this new religion of
thine. Hell or Hades thou didst call it — a place where
the vital essence lives and retains an individual memory,
and where all the errors and faults of judgment, and un-
satisfied passions and the unsubstantial terrors of the
mind wherewith it hath at any time had to do, come to
mock and haunt and gibe and wring the hear-t for ever
and for ever with the vision of its own hopelessness. Thus,
even thus, have I lived for fuU two thousand years — for some
six and sixty generations, as ye reckon time — in a Hell,
as thou caUest it — tormented by the memory of a crime,
tortured day and night with an unfulfilled desire — without
companionship, without comfort, without death, and led on
only down nay dreary road by the marsh lights of Hope,
which though they flickered here and there, and now
glowed strong, ancl now were not, yet, as my skill told me,
would one day lead unto my deliverer.

' And then — think of it still, oh HoUy, for never shalt
thou hear such another tale, or see such another scene,
nay, not even if I give thee ten thousand years of life —
and thou shalt have it in payment if thou wilt — think : at
last my deliverer came — he for whom I had watched and
waited through the generations — at the appointed time he
came to seek me, as I knew that he must come, for my
wisdom could not err, though I knew not when or how.
Yet see how ignorant I was ! See how small my know-
ledge, and how fe.int my strength 1 For hours he lay here
sick unto death, and I felt it not — I who had waited for
him for two thousand years — I knew it not. And then at

200 SHE

last I see him, and behold, my chance is gone but by a
hair's breadth even before I have it, for he is in the very
jaws of death ; whence no power of mine can draw him.
And if he die, surely must the Hell be lived through once
more — once more must I face the weary centuries, and wait,
and wait till the time in its fulness shall bring my beloved
back to me. And then thou gavest him the medicine,
and that five minutes dragged along before I knew if
he would live or die, and I tell thee that all the sixty
generations that are gone were not so long as that five
minutes. But they passed at length, and still he showed no
sign, and I knew that if the drug works not then, so far as
I have had knowledge, it works not at all. Then thought I
that he was once more dead, and all the tortures of all the
years gathered themselves into a single venomed spear,
and pierced me through and through, because once again
I had lost Kallikratea ! And then, when all was done,
behold 1 he sighed, behold ! he lived, and I knew that he
would live, for none die on whom the drug takes hold.
Think of it now, my HoUy — think of the wonder of it !
He will sleep for twelve hours, and then the fever will
have left him ! '

She stopped, and laid her hand upon the golden
head, and then bent down and kissed the brow with a
chastened abandonment of tenderness that would have
been beautiful to behold had not the sight cut me to the
heart — for I was jealous 1

201

xvm.

GO, WOMAN !

Then followed a silence of a minute or so, during whicli
She appeared, if one might judge fromthe almost angelic
rapture of her face — for she looked angelic sometimes —
to be plunged in a happy ecstasy. Suddenly, however, a
new thought struck her, and her expression became the
very reverse of angeKo.

'Almost had I forgotten,' she said, 'that woman,

Ustane. What is she to KaUikrates — his servant, or '

and she paused, and her voice trembled.

I shrugged my shoulders. ' I understand that she is
wed to him according to the custom of the Amahagger,' I
answered ; ' but I know not.'

Her face grew dark as a thunder-cloud. Old as she
was, Ayesha had not outlived jealousy.

' Then there is an end,' she said ; ' she must die, even
now! '

' For what crime ? ' I asked, horrified. ' She is guilty
of naught that thou art not guilty of thyself, oh Ayesha.
She loves the man, and he has been pleased to accept her
love : where, then, is her sin ? '

' Truly, oh Holly, thou art foolish,' she answered,
almost petulantly. ' Where is her sin ? Her sin is that
she stands between me and my desire. Well, I know that
I can take him from her — ^for dwells there a man upon
this earth, oh HoUy, who could resist me if I put out my
strength ? Men are faithful for so long only as temp-
tations pass them by. If the temptation be but strong
enough, then will the man yield, for every man, like
every rope, hath his breaking strain, and passion is to

202 SHE

men what gold and power are to women — the weight
upon their weakness. Believe me, ill will it go with
mortal women in that heaven of which thou speakest, if
only the spirits be more fair, for their lords will never turn
to look upon them, and their heaven will become their
hell. For man can be bought with woman's beauty, if it
be but beautiful enough ; and woman's beauty can be ever
bought with gold, if only there be gold enough. So was
it in my day, and so it will be to the end of time. The
world is a great mart, my Holly, where all things are for
sale to him who bids the highest in the currency of our
desires.'

These remarks, which were as cynical as might have
been expected from a woman of Ayesha's age and ex-
perience, jarred upon me, and I answered, testily, that
in our heaven there was no marriage or giving in
marriage.

' Else would it not be heaven, dost thou mean ? ' she
put in. ' Fie upon thee. Holly, to think so ill of us poor
women ! Is it, then, marriage that marks the line be-
tween thy heaven and thy heU ? But enough of this.
This is no time for disputing and the challenge of our
wits. Why dost thou always dispute ? Art thou also
a philosopher of these latter days ? As for this woman,
she must die ; for though I can take her lover from her,
yet, while she lived, might he think tenderly of her, and
that I cannot away with. No other woman shall dwell
in my Lord's thoughts; my empire shall be all my own.
She hath had her day, let her be content ; for better is an
hour with love than a century of loneliness — ^now the night
shall swallow her.'

' Nay, nay,' I cried, ' it would be a wicked crime ; and
from a crime naught comes but what is evil. For thine
own sake do not this deed.'

' Is it, then, a crime, oh foolish man, to put away that
which stands between us and our ends ? Then is our life
one long crime, my Holly ; for day by day we destroy that
we may live, since in this world none save the strongest

GO, WOMAN! 203

can endure. Those wlio are weak must periah ; tlie earth
is to the strong, and the fruits thereof. For every tree
that grows a score shall wither, that the strong ones may
take their share. We run to place and power over the
dead bodies of those who fail and fall ; ay, we win the food
we eat from out the mouths of starving babes. It is the •
scheme of things. Thou sayest, too, that a crime breeds
evil, but therein thou dost lack experience ; for out of
crimes come many good things, and out of good grows
much evil. The cruel rage of the tyrant may prove a
blessing to thousands who come after him, and the sweet-
heartedness of a holy man may make a nation slaves.
Man doeth this and doeth that from the good or evU of his
heart ; but he knoweth not to what end his moral sense
doth prompt him ; for when he striketh he is blind to
where the blow shall fall, nor can he count the airy threads
that weave the web of circumstance. Good and evil, love
and hate, night and day, sweet and bitter, man and woman,
heaven above and the earth beneath — all these things are
necessary, one to the other, and who knows the end of
each ? I tell thee that there is a hand of Fate that twines
them up to bear the burden of its purpose, and all things
are gathered in that great rope to which all things are
needful. Therefore doth it not become us to say this thing
is evil and this good, or the dark is hateful and the light
lovely ; for to other eyes than ours the evil may be the
good and the darkness more beautiful than the day, or all
alike be fair. Hearest thou, my Holly ? '

I felt it was hopeless to argue against casuistry of this
nature, which, if it were carried to its logical conclusion,
would absolutely destroy all morality, as we tmderstand it.
But her talk gave me a fresh thrill of fear ; for what may
not be possible to a being who, unconstrained by human
law, is also absolutely unshackled by a moral sense of right
and wrong, which, however partial arid conventional it may
be, is yet based, as our conscience tells us, upon the great
wall of individual responsibility that marks off mankind
from the beasts ?

204 SHE

But I was deeply anxious to save Ustane, whom I liked
and respected, from the dire fate that overshadowed her
at the hands of her mighty rival. So I made one more
appeal.

' Ayesha,' I said, ' thou art too subtle forme ; but thou
thyself hast told me that each man should be a law unto
himself, and follow the teaching of his heart. Hath thy
heart no mercy towards her whose place thou wouldst take ?
Bethink thee, as thou sayest — though to me the thing is
incredible — him whom thou desirest has returned to thee
after many ages, and but now thou hast, as thou sayest
also, wrung him from the jaws of death. Wilt thou cele-
brate his coming by the murder of one who loved him, and
whom perchance he loved — one, at the least, who saved
his life for thee when the spears of thy slaves would have
made an end thereof? Thou sayest also that in past days
thou didst grievously wrong this man, that with thine own
hand thou didst slay him because of the Egyptian Amen-
artas whom he loved,'

' How knowest thou that, oh stranger ? How knowest
thou that name ? I spoke it not to thee,' she broke in
with a cry, catching at my arm.

' Perchance I dreamed it,' I answered ; ' strange dreams
do hover about these caves of Kor, It seems that the
dream was, indeed, a shadow of the truth. What came to
thee of thy mad crime ? — two thousand years of waiting,
was it not ? And now wouldst thou repeat the history ?
Say what thou wilt, I teU thee that evil wUl come of it ;
for to him who doeth, at the least, good breeds good and
evil evil, even though in after days out of evil cometh good.
Offences must needs come ; but woe to him by whom the
offence cometh. So said that Messiah of whom I spoke to
thee, and it was truly said. If thou slayest this innocent
woman, I say unto thee that thou shalt be accursed, and
pluck no fruit from thine ancient tree of love. Also, what
thinkest thou ? How will this man take thee red-handed
from the slaughter of her who loved and tended him ? '

' As to that,' she answered, ' I have already answered

GO, WOMAN/ 205

thee. Had I slain thee as well as her, yet should he love
me, Holly, because he could not save himself therefrom
any more than thou couldst save thyself from dying, if by
chance I slew thee, oh Holly. And yet maybe there is
truth in what thou dost say ; for in some way it presseth
on my mind. If it may be, I will spare this woman ; for
have I not told thee that I am not cruel for the sake of
cruelty ? I love not to see suffering, or to cause it. Let
her come before me — quick now, before my mood changes,'
and she hastily covered her face with its gauzy wrapping.

Well pleased to have succeeded even to this extent, I
passed out into the passage and called to Ustane, whose
white garment I caught sight of some yards away, huddled
up against one of the earthenware lamps that were placed
at intervals along the tunnel. She rose, and ran towards
me.

'Is my lord dead? Oh, say not he is dead,' she cried,
lifting her noble-looking face, all stained as it was with
tears, up to me with an air of infinite beseeching that went
straight to my heart.

'Nay, he lives,' I answered. 'She hath saved him.
Enter.'

She sighed deeply, entered, and fell upon her hands and
knees, after the custom of the Amahagger people, in the
presence of the dread She.

' Stand,' said Ayesha in her coldest voice, ' and come
hither.'

Ustane obeyed, standing before her with bowed head.

Then came a pause, which Ayesha broke.

' Who is this man ? ' she said, pointing to the sleeping
form of Leo.

' The man is my husband,' she answered in a low
voice.

' Who gave him to thee for a husband ? '

' I took him according to the custom of our country,
oh She.'

' Thou hast done evil, woman, in taking this man, who
is a stranger. He is not a man of thine own race, and

2o6 SHE

the custom fails. Listen : perchance thou didst this thing
through ignorance, therefore, woman, do I spare thee,
otherwise hadst thou died. Listen again. Go from hence
back to thiae own place, and never dare to speak to or
set thine eyes upon this man again. He is not for thee.
Listen a third time. If thou breakest this my law, that
moment thou diest. Go.'

But Ustane did not move.

' Go, woman ! '

Then she looked up, and I saw that her face was torn
with passion.

' Nay, oh She, I will not- go,' she answered in a choked
voice : ' the man is my husband, and I love him — I love
him, and I will not leave him. What right hast thou to
command me to leave my husband ? '

I saw a little quiver pass down Ayesha's frame, and
shuddered myself, fearing the worst.

' Be pitiful,' I said in Latin ; ' it is but Nature
worldng.'

' I am pitiful,' she answered coldly in the same lan-
guage ; ' had I not been pitiful she had been dead even
now.' Then addressing Ustane : ' Woman, I say to thee,
go before I destroy thee where thou art ! '

' I will not go ! He is mine — mine ! ' she cried in
anguish. ' I took him, and I saved his life ! Destroy me,
then, if thou hast the power 1 I will not give thee my
husband— never — never ! '

Ayesha made a movement so swift that I could scarcely
follow it, but it seemed to me that she hghtly struck
the poor girl upon the head with her hand. I looked
at Ustane, and then staggered back in horror, for there
upon her hair, right across her bronze-like tresses, were
three finger-marks white as snow. As for the girl her-
self, she had put her hands to her head, and was looking
dazed.

' Great heavens 1 ' I said, perfectly aghast at this di-ead-
ful manifestation of inhuman power; but She did but
laugh a httle.

GO, WOMAN! 207

' Thou thinkest, poor ignorant fool,' she said to the
bewildered woman, ' that I have not power to slay. Stay,
there lies a mirror,' and she pointed to Leo's round
shaving-glass that had been arranged by Job with other
things upon his portmanteau ; ' give it to this woman, my
Holly, and let her see that which lies across her hair, and
whether or no I have power to slay.'

I picked up the glass, and held it before Ustane's eyes.
She gazed, then felt at her hair, then gazed again, and
then sank upon the ground with a sort of sob.

' Now, wilt thou go, or must I strike a second -time ? '
asked Ayesha, in mockery. 'Look, I have set my seal upon
thee so that I may know thee till thy hair is aU as white
as it. If I see thy face here again, be sure, too, that thy
bones shall soon be whiter than my mark upon thy hair.'

Utterly awed and broken down, the poor creature rose,
and,, marked with that awful mark, crept from the room
sobbing bitterly.

'Look not so frighted, my HoUy,' said Ayesha, when
she had gone.- ' I tell thee I deal not in magic— there is
no such thing. 'Tis only a force that thou dost not xmder-
stand. I marked her to strike terror to her heart, else
must I have slain her. And now I wUl bid my servants
bear my Lord Kallikrates to a chamber near mine own,
that I may watch over him, and be ready to greet him
when he wakes ; and thither, too, shalt thou come, my
Holly, and the white man, thy servant. But one thing
remember at thy peril. Naught shalt thou say to Kalli-
krates as to how this woman went, and as little as may be
of me. Now, I have warned thee ! ' and she slid away to
give her orders, leaving me more absolutely confounded
than ever. Indeed, so bewildered was I, and racked and
torn with such a succession of various emotions, that I
began to think that I must be going mad. However,
perhaps fortunately, I had but little time to reflect, for
presently the mutes arrived to carry the sleeping Leo and
our possessions across the central cave, so for a while all
was bustle. Our new rooms were situated immediately

2oS SHE

behind what we used to call Ayesha's boudoir— the cur-
tained space where I had first seen her. Where she her-
self slept I did not then know, but it was somewhere quite
close.

That night I passed in Leo's room, but he slept through
it like the dead, never once stirring. I also slept fairly
well, as, indeed, I needed to do, but my sleep was full of
dreams of all the horrors and wonders I had undergone.
Chiefly, however, I was haunted by that frightful piece of
diablerie by which Ayesha left her finger marks upon her
rival's hair. There was something so terrible about the
swift, snake-hke movement, and the instantaneous blanch-
ing of that threefold line, that, if the results to Ustane
had been much more tremendous, I doubt if they would
have impressed me so deeply. To this day I often dream
of that awful scene, and see the weeping woman, bereaved,
and marked like Cain, cast a last look at her lover, and
creep from the presence of her dread Queen.

Another dream that troubled me originated in the huge
pyramid of bones. I dreamed that they all stood up and
marched past me in thousands and tens of thousands— in
squadrons, companies, and armies — with the sunlight
shining through their hoUow ribs. On they rushed
across the plain to K6r, their imperial home ; I saw the
drawbridges fall before them, and heard their bones clank
through the brazen gates. On they went, up the splendid
streets, on past fountains, palaces, and temples such as the
eye of man never saw. But there was no man to greet
them in the market-place, and no woman's face appeared
at the windows — only a bodiless voice went before them,
calling : ' Fallen is Imperial K6r I — fallen 1 — fallen !
fallen I ' On, right through the city, marched those
gleaming phalanxes, and the rattle of their bony tread
echoed through the silent air as they pressed grimly on.
They passed through the city and chmbed the wall, and
marched along the great roadway that was made upon
the wall, tUl at length they once more reached the draw-
bridge. Then, as the sun was sinking, they returned again

GO, WOMAN/ 209

towards their sepulclire, and luridly hia light shone in the
sockets of their empty eyes, throwing gigantic shadows of
their bones, that stretched away, and crept and crept like
huge spider's legs as their armies wound across the plain.
Then they came to the cave, and once more one by one
flung themselves in unending files through the hole into
the pit of bones, and I awoke, shuddering, to see SJie, who
had evidently been standing between my couch and Leo's,
glide like a shadow from the room.

After this I slept again, soundly this time, till morning,
when I awoke much refreshed, and got up. At last the
hour drew near at which, according to Ayesha, Leo was
to awake, and with it came Shs herself, as usual, veiled.

' Thou shalt see, oh Holly,' she said ; ' presently shall
he awake in his right mind, the fever having left him.'

Hardly were the words out of her mouth, when Leo
turned round and stretched out his arms, yawned, opened
his eyes, and, perceiving a female form bending over him,
threw his arms round her and kissed her, mistaking her,
perhaps, for Ustane. At any rate, he said, in Arabic,
' Hullo, Ustane, why have you tied your head up like that ?
Have you got the toothache ? ' and then, in EngKsh, ' I say,
I'm awfully hungry. Why, Job, you old son of a gun,
where the deuce have we got to now — eh ? '

' I am sure I wish I knew, Mr. Leo,' said Job, edging
suspiciously past Ayesha, whom he stiU regarded with the
utinost disgust and horror, being by no means sure that
she was not an animated corpse ; ' but you mustn't talk,
Mr. Leo, you've been very iU, and given us a great deal of
hanxiety, and, if this lady,' looking at Ayesha, ' would be
so kind as to move, I'll bring you your soup.'

This turned Leo's attention to the 'lady,' who was
standing by in perfect silence. ' Hullo ! ' he said ; • that is
not Ustane — where is Ustane ? '

Then, for the first time, Ayesha spoke to him, and her
first words were a He. ' She has gone from hence upon a
visit,' she said ; ' and, behold, in her place am I here as
thine handmaiden,'

S

2IO SHE

Ayesha's silver notes seemed to puzzle Leo's half-
awakened intellect, as also did lier corpse-like wrappings.
However, he said nothing at the time, but drank off his soup
greedily enough, and then turned over and slept again till
the evening. When he woke for the second titne he saw
me, and began to question me as to what had happened, but
I had to put him off as best I could till the morrow, when
he awoke almost miraculously better. Then I told him
something of his illness and of my doings, but as Ayesha
was present I could not tell him much except that she was
the Queen of the country, and well disposed towards us,
and that it was her pleasure to go veiled ; for, though of
course I spoke in English, I was afraid that she might
understand what we were saying from the expression of
our faces, and besides, I remembered her warning.

On the following day Leo got up almost entirely
recovered. The flesh wound in his side was healed, and
his constitution, naturally a vigorous one, had shaken off
the exhaustion consequent on his terrible fever with a
rapidity that I can only attribute to the effects of the won-
derful drug which Ayesha had given to him, and also to
the fact that his illness had been too short to reduce him
very much. With his returning health came back full
recollection of all his adventures up to the time when he
had lost consciousness in the marsh, and of course of
Ustane also, to whom I had discovered he had grown con-
siderably attached. Indeed, he overwhelmed me with
questions about the poor girl, which I did not dare to
answer, for after Leo's first wakening She had sent for me,
and again warned me solemnly that I was to reveal nothing
of the story to him, delicately hinting that if I did it would
be the worse for me. She also, for the second time,
cautioned me not to tell Leo anything more than I was
obliged about herself, saying that she would reveal herself
to him in her own time.

Lideed, her whole manner changed. After all that I
had seen I had expected that she would take the earliest
opportunity of claiming the man she believed to be her

GO, WOMAN! 21 r

old-world lover, but this, for some reason of her own,
which was at the time quite inscrutable to me, she did not
do. AU that she did was to attend to his wants quietly,
and with a humility which was in striking contrast with her
former imperious bearing, addressing him always in a tone
of something very like respect, and keeping him with her
as much as possible. Of course his curiosity was as much
excited about this mysterious woman as my own had been,
and he was particularly anxious to see her face, which I
had, without entering into particulars, told him was as
lovely as her form and voice. This in itself was enough
to raise the expectations of any young man to a dangerous
pitch, and had it not been that he had not as yet completely
shaken off the effects of ilhiess, and was much troubled in
his inind about Ustane, of whose affection and brave
devotion he spoke in touching terms, I have no doubt that
he would have entered into her plans, and fallen in love
with her by anticipation. As it was, however, he was
simply wildly curious, and also, like myself, considerably
awed, for though no hint had been given to him by Ayesha
of her extraordinary age, he not unnaturally came to iden-
tify her with the woman spoken of on the potsherd. At last,
quite driven into a corner by his continual questions, which
he showered on me while he was dressing on this third
morning, I referred him to Ayesha, saying, with perfect
truth, that I did not know where Ustane was. Accord-
ingly, after Leo had eaten a hearty breakfast, we adjourned
into She's presence, for her mutes had orders to admit us
at all hours.

She was, as usual, seated in what, for want of a
better term, we called her boudoir, and oh the curtains
being drawn she rose from her couch and, stretching out
both hands, came forward to greet us, or rather Leo ; for
I, as may be imagined, was now quite left in the cold. It
was a pretty sight to see her veiled form gliding towards
the sturdy young EngUshman, dressed in his grey flannel
suit ; for though he is half a Greek in blood, Leo is, with
the exception of his hair, one of the most English-looking

■si

212 SHE

men I ever saw. He has nothing of the supple form or
slippery manner of the modem Greek ahout him, though I
presume that he got his remarkable personal beauty from
his foreign mother, whose portrait he resembles not a little.
He is very tall and big-chested, and yet not awkward, as so
many big men are, and his head is set upon him in such
a fashion as to give him a proud and vigorous air, which
was well translated in his Amahagger name of the ' Lion.'

' Greeting to thee, my young stranger lord,' she said
in her softest voice. ' Eight glad am I to see thee upon
thy feet. Believe me, had I not saved thee at the last,
never wouldst thou have stood upon those feet again. But
the danger is done, and it shall be my care ' — and she
flung a world of meaning into the words — ' that it doth
return no more.'

Leo bowed to her, and then, in his best Arabic, thanked
her for all her kindness and courtesy in caring for one
unknown to her.

' Nay,' she answered softly, • iU could the world spare
such a man. Beauty is too rare upon it. Give me no
thanks, who am made happy by thy coming.'

'Humph! old fellow,' said Leo aside to me in Eng-
lish, ' the lady is very civil. We seem to have tumbled
into clover. I hope that you have made the most of your
opportunities. By Jove! what a pair of arms she has
got!' , _ _

I nudged him in the ribs to make him keep quiet, for
I caught sight of a gleam from Ayesha's veiled eyes,
which were regarding me curiously.

' I trust,' went on Ayesha, ' that my servants have
attended well upon thee ; if there can be comfort in this
poor place, be sure it waits on thee. Is there aught that
I can do for thee more ? '

' Yes, oh S'/se,' answered Leo hastily. ' I would fain
know whither the young lady who was looking after me has
gone to.'

' Ah,' said Ayesha : ' the girl— yes, I saw her. Nay, 1
know not; she said that she would go, I {enow not

GO, WOMAN/ 213

whither. Perchance she will return, perchance not. It
is wearisome waiting on the sick, and these savage women
are fickle.'

Leo looked hoth sulky and distressed at this in-
telligence.

' It's very odd,' he said to me in English ; and then
addressing She, 'I cannot understand,' he said; 'the
young lady and I — well — in short, we had a regard for
each other.'

Ayesha laughed a little very musically, and then turned
the subject.

!i4 - SHE

XIX.

' GIVE ME A BLACK GOAT ! '

The conversation after this was of such a desultory order
that I do not quite recoUeet it. For some reason, perhaps
from a desire to keep her identity and character in reserve,
Ayesha did not talk freely, as she usually did. Presently,
however, she informed Leo that she had arranged a dance
that night for our amusement. I was astonished to hear
this, as I fancied that the Amahagger were much too
gloomy a folk to indulge in any such frivolity ; but, as
will presently more clearly appear, it turned out that an
Amahagger dance has little in common with such fantas-
tic festivities in other countries, savage or civilised. Then,
as we were about to withdraw, she suggested that Leo
might like to see some of the wonders of the caves, and as
he gladly assented thither we departed, accompanied by Job
and Billali. To describe our visit would only be to repeat
a great deal of what I have already said. The tombs we
entered were indeed different, for the whole rock was a
honeycomb of sepulchres,' but the contents were nearly
always similar. Afterwards we visited the pyramid of bones
that had haunted my dreams on the previous night, and
from thence went down a long passage to one of the great
vaults occupied by the bodies of the poorer citizens of
Imperial Kor. These bodies were not nearly so well pre-
served as were those of the wealthier classes. Many of

• For a long -while it puzzled me to know what could have been
done with the enormous quantities of rock that must have been dug
out of these vast caves ; but I afterwards discovered that it was for
the most part built into the walls and palaces of Kor, and also used
to line the reservoirs and sewers. — L. H. H.

'GIVE ME A BLACK GOAT." 215

them had no linen covering on them, also they were buried
from five hundred to one thousand in a single large vault,
the corpses in some instances being thickly piled one upon
another, like a heap of slain.

Leo was of course intensely interested in this stupen-
dous' and unequalled sight, which was, indeed, enough to
awake all the imagination a man had in him into the
most aotivehfe. But to poor Job it did not prove attrac-
tive. His nerves — already seriously shaken by what he
had undergone since we had arrived in this terrible
country — ^were, as may be imagined, still further disturbed
by the spectacle of these masses of departed humanity,
whereof the forms still remained perfect before his eyes,
though their voices were for ever lost in the eternal silence
of the tomb. Nor was he comforted when old BiUali, by
way of soothing his evident agitation, informed him that he
should not be frightened of these dead things, as he woxdd
soon be like them himself.

' There's a nice thing to say of a man, sir,' he ejacu-
lated, when I translated this Httle remark ; ' but there,
what can one expect of an old man-eating savage ? Not
but what I dare say he's right,' and Job sighed.

When we had finished inspecting the caves, we returned
and had our meal, for it was now past four in the afternoon,
and we all — especially Leo — needed some food and rest. At
six o'clock we, together with Job, waited on Ayesha, who set
to work to terrify our poor servant still further by showing
him pictures on the pool of water in. the font-like vessel.
She learnt from me that he was one of seventeen children,
and then bid him think of all his brothers and sisters, or
as many of them as he could, gathered together in his
father's cottage. Then she told him to look in the water,
and there, reflected from its stilly surface, was that dead
scene of many years gone by, as it was recalled to our
retainer's brain. Some of the faces were clear enough,
but some were mere blurrs and splotches, or with one
feature grossly exaggerated ; the fact being that, in these
instances, Job had been miable to recall the exact

8i6 SHE .

appearances of the individuals, or remembered them only
by a peculiarity of his tribe, and the water could only re-
flect what he saw with his mind's eye. For it must be
remembered that fi'/ie's power in this matter was strictly
limited ; she could apparently, except in very rare instances,
only photograph tipon the water what was actually ia the
mind of some one present, and then only by his vyill. But
if she was personally acquainted with a locality, she could,
as in the case of ourselves and the whale-boat, throw its
reflection upon the water, and also it seems the reflection
of anything extraneous that was passing there at the time.
This power, however, did not extend to the minds of others.
For instance, she could show me the interior of my college
chapel, as I remembered it, but not as it was at the moment
of reflection ; for, where other people were concerned, her
art was strictly limited to the facts or memories present
to fheir consciousness at the moment. So much was this
so, that when we tried, for her amusement, to show her
pictures of noted buildings, such as St. Paul's or the
Houses of Parliament, the result was most imperfect ; for,
of course, though we had a good general idea of their
appearance, we could not recall all the architectural details,
and therefore the minutiae necessary to a perfect reflection
were wanting. But Job could not be got to understand this,
and so far from accepting a natural explanation of the matter,
which was after all, though strange enough in all conscience,
nothing more than an instance of glorified and perfected
telepathy, he set the whole thing down as a manifestation
of the blackest magic. I shall never forget the howl of
terror which he uttered when he saw the more or less per-
fect portraits of his long-scattered brethren staring at him
from the quiet water, or the merry peal of laughter vrith
which Ayesha greeted his consternation. As for Leo, he
did not altogether like it either, but ran his fingers
through his yellow curls, and remarked that it gave him
the creeps.

After about an hour of this amusement, in the latter
part of which Job did not participate, the mutes by signs

'GIVE ME A BLACK GOAT." 217

incTicated that Billali was waiting for an audience. Ac-
cordingly he was told to ' crawl up,' which he did as
awkwardly as usual, and announced that the dance was
ready to begin if She and the white strangers would be
pleased to attend. Shortly afterwards we all rose, and
Ayosha having thrown a dark cloak (the same, by the way,
that she had worn when I saw her cursing by the fire)
over her white wrappings, we started. The dance was to
be held in the open air, on the smooth rocky plateau in
front of the great cave, and thither we made our way.
About fifteen paces from the mouth of the cave we found
three chairs placed, and here we sat and waited, for as
yet no dancers were to be seen. The night was almost,
but not quite, dark, the moon not having risen as yet,
which made us wonder how we should be able to see the
dancing.

' Thou wilt presently understand,' said Ayesha, with a
little laugh, when Leo asked her ; and we certainly did.
Scarcely were the words out of her mouth when from
every point we saw dark forms rushing up, each bearing
with him what we at first took to be an enormous flaming
torch. Whatever they were they were burning furiously,
for the flames stood out a yard or more behind each bearer.
On they came, fifty or more of them, carrying their flam-
ing burdens and looking like so many devils from hell.
Leo was the first to discover what these burdens were.

' Great heaven ! ' he said, ' they are corpses on fire ! '

I stared and stared again — ^he was perfectly right — the
torches that were to light our entertainment were humaii
mummies from the caves !

On rushed the bearers of the flaming corpses, and,
meeting at a spot about twenty paces in front of us, built
their ghastly burdens crossways into a huge bonfire.
Heavens 1 how they roared and flared I No tar barrel
could have burnt as those mummies did. Nor was this
all. Suddenly I saw one great feUow seize a flaming
human arm that had fallen from its parent frame, and rush
off into the darkness. Presently he stopped, and a tall

2i8 SHE

streak of fire shot up into the air, illumining the gloom,
and also the lamp from which it sprang. That lamp was
the mummy of a woman tied to a stout state let into the
rock, and he had fired her hair. On he went a few paces
and touched a second, then a third, and a fourth, till at
last we were surrounded on all three sides by a great ring
of bodies flaring furiously, the material with which they
were preserved having rendered them so inflammable that
the flames would literally spout out of the ears and mouth
in tongues of fire a foot or more in length.

Nero illuminated his gardens with live Christians
soaked in tar, and we were now treated to a similar
spectacle, probably for the first time since his day, only
happily our lamps were not living ones.

But although this element of horror was fortunately
wanting, to describe the awful and hideous grandeur "of
the spectacle thus presented to us is, I feel, so absolutely
beyond my poor powers, that I scarcely dare attempt
it. To begin with, it appealed to the moral as well as
the physical suseeptibihties. There was something very
terrible, and yet very fascinating, about the employment
of the remote dead to illumine the orgies of the Hving ; in
itself the thing was a satire, both on the living and the
dead. Csesar's dust — or is it Alexander's? — ^may stop a
bunghole, but the functions of these dead Csesars of the
past was to light up a savage fetish dance. To such base
uses may we come, of so little account may we be in the
minds of the eager multitudes that we shall breed, many
of whom, so far fi:om revering our memory, will live to
curse us for begetting them into such a world of woe.

Then there was the physical side of the spectacle, and
a weird and splendid one it was. Those old citizens of K6r'
burnt as, to judge from their sculptures and inscriptions,
they had lived, very fast, and with the utmost liberality.
What is more, there were plenty of them. As soon as ever
a mummy had burnt down to the ankles, which it did
in about twenty minutes, the feet were kicked away, and
another one put in its place. The boiifire was kept going

'GIVR.ME A BLACK GOAT." 219

on the same generous scale, and its flames sliot up, with a
hiss and a crackle, twenty or thirty feet into the air, throw-
ing great flashes of light far out into the gloom, through
which the dark forms of the Amahagger flitted to and fro
like devUs replenishing the infernal fires. We all stood and
stared aghast — shocked, and yet fascinated at so strange
a spectacle, and haK-expecting to see the spirits those
flaming forms had once enclosed come creeping from the
shadows to work vengeance on their desecrators.

'I promised thee a strange sight, my Holly,' laughed
Ayesha, whose nerves alone did not seem to he affected ;
' and, behold, I have not failed thee. Also, it hath its
lesson. Trust not to the future, for who knows what the
future may bring ! Therefore, Hve for the day, and endea-
vour not to escape the dust which seems to be man's end.
What thinkest thou those long-forgotten nobles and ladies
would have felt had they known that they should one day
flare to light the dance or boil the pot of savages ? But
see, here come the dancers ; a merry crew — are they not ?
The stage is ht — now for the play.'

As she spoke, we perceived two lines of figures, one
male and the other female, to the number of about a hun-
dred, each advancing round the human bonfire, arrayed
only in the usual leopard and buck skins. They formed
up, in perfect sUence, in two Hnes, facing each other be-
tween us and the fire, and then the dance — a sort of infer-
nal and fiendish cancan — began. To describe it is quite
impossible, but, though there was a good deal of tossing of
legs and double- shuffling, it seemed to our untutored minds
to be more of a play than a dance, and, as usual with this
dreadful people, whose minds seem to have taken their
colour from the caves in which they live, and whose jokes
and amusements are drawn from the inexhaustible stores
of preserved mortality with which they share their homes,
the subject appeared to be a most ghastly one. I know
that it represented an attempted murder first of all, and
then the burial alive of the victim and his struggling from
the grave ; each act of the abominable drama, which was

220 SHE

carried on in perfect silence, being rounded off and finished
with a furious and most revolting dance round the supposed
victim, who writhed upon the ground in the red light of
the bonfire.

Presently, however, this pleasing piece was interrupted.
Suddenly there was a slight commotion, and a large power-
ful woman, whom I had noted as one of the most vigorous
of the dancers, came, made mad and drunken with unholy
excitement, bounding and staggering towards us, shrieking
out as she came : —

' I want a black goat, I must have a black goat, bring
me a black goat ! ' and down she fell upon the rocky floor
foaming and writhing, and shrieking for a black goat,
about as hideous a spectacle as can well be conceived.

Instantly most of the dancers came up and got round
her, though some still continued their capers in the back-
ground. ■

' She has got a Devil,' called out one of them. ' Eun
and get a black goat. There, Devil, keep quiet 1 keep
quiet 1 You shall have the goat presently. They have
gone to fetch it. Devil.'

' I want a black goat, I must have a black goat ! '
shrieked the foaming rolling creature again.

' All right. Devil, the goat will be here presently ; keep
quiet, there's a good Devil ! '

And so on till the goat taken from a neighbouring kraal
did at last arrive, being dragged bleating on to the scene
by its horns.

■ f Is it a black one, is it a black one ? ' shrieked the
possessed.

' Yes, yes. Devil, as black as night ; ' then aside, ' keep it
behind thee, don't let the Devil see that it has got a white
spot on its rump and another on its belly. In one minute.
Devil. There, cut his throat quick. Where is the saucer ? '

' The goat ! the goat 1 the goat ! Give me the blood
of my black goat ! I must have it, don't you see I must
have it ? Oh ! oh 1 oh ! give me the blood of the goat.'

At this moment a terrified hali I announced that the

'GIVE ME A BLACK GOAT." 221

poor goat had been sacrificed, and the next minute a woman
ran up with a saucer full of the blood. This the possessed
creature, who was then raving and foaming her wildest,
seized and drank, and was instantly recovered, and without
a trace of hysteria, or fits, or being possessed, or whatever
dreadful thing it was she was suffering from. She stretched
her arms, smiled faintly, and walked quietly back to the
dancers, who presently withdrew in a double line as they
had come, leaving the space between us and the bonfire
deserted.

I thought that the entertainment was now over, and,
feeling rather queer, was about to ask She if we could rise,
when suddenly what at first I took to be a baboon came
hopping round the fire, and was instantly met upon the
other side by a lion, or rather a human being dressed in a
lion's skin. Then came a goat, then a man wrapped in an
ox's hide, with the horns wobbling about in a ludicrous
way. After him followed a blesbok, then an impala, then a
koodoo, then more goats, and many other animals, includ-
ing a girl sewn up in the shining scaly hide of a boa con-
strictor, several yards of which trailed along the ground
behind her. When all the beasts had collected they began
to dance about in a lumbering, unnatural fashion, and to
imitate the sounds produced by the respective animals they
represented, tiU the whole air was alive with roars and
bleating and the hissing of snakes. This went on for a
long time, till, getting tired of the pantomime, I asked
Ayesha if there would be any objection to Leo and myself
walking round to inspect the human torches, and, as sfya
had nothing to say against it, we started, striking round'to
the left. After looking at one or two of the flaming bodies,
we were about to return, thoroughly disgusted with the .
grotesque weirdness of the spectacle, when our attention
was attracted by one of the dancers, a particularly active
leopard, that had separated itself from its fellow-beasts,
and was whisking about in our immediate neighbourhood,
but gradually drawing into a spot where the shadow was
darkest, equidistant between two of the flaming mummies.

222 SHE

Drawn by curiosity, we followed it, when suddenly it darted
past us into the shadows beyond, and as it did so erected
itself and whispered, ' Come,' in a voice that we both recog-
nised as that of Ustane. Without waiting to consult me
Leo turned and followed her into the outer darkness, and
I, feeling sick enough at heart, went after them. The
leopard crawled on for about fifty paces — a sufficient dis-
tance to be quite beyond the light of the fire and torches —
and then Leo came up with it, or, rather, with Ustane.

' Oh, my lord,' I heard her whisper, 'so I have found
thee ! Listen. I am in perU of my life from " She-who-must-
be-oheyed." Surely the Baboon has told thee how she
drove me firom thee ? I love thee, my lord, and thou art
mine according to the custom of the country. I saved thy
life ! My Lion, wilt thou cast me off now ? '

' Of course not,' ejaculated Leo ; ' I have been wondering
whither thou hadst gone. Let us go and explain matters
to the Queen.'

' Nay, nay, she would slay us. Thou Imowest not her
power — the Baboon there, he knoweth, for he saw. Nay,
there is but one way : if thou wUt cleave to me, thou must
flee with me across the marshes even now, and then per-
chance we may escape.'

' For Heaven's |ake, Leo,' I began, but she broke in —

' Nay, listen not to him. Swift — be swift — death 'is in .
the air we breathe. Even now, mayhap^ She heareth us,'
and without more ado she proceeded to back her arguments
by throwing herself into his arms. As she did so the
leopard's head slipped from her hair, and I saw the three
white finger-marks upon it, gleaming faintly in the star-
light. Once more realising the de^rate nature of the
position, I was about to interpose, for I knew that Leo
was not too strong-minded where women were concerned,
when — oh ! horror ! — I heard a little silvery laugh behind
me. I turned round, and there was She herself, and with
her Billali and, two male mutes. I gasped and nearly
sank to the ground, for I knew that such a situation must
result in some dreadful tragedy, of which it seemed exceed-

'GIVE ME A BLACK GOAT! 223

ingly probable to me that I should be the first victim. As
for Ustane, she untwined her arms and covered her eyes
with her hands, while Leo, not blowing the.full terror of
the position, merely coloured up, and looked as foolish as
a man caught in such a trap would naturally do.

224 SHE

XX.

TBIUMPH.

Then followed a moment of the most painful silence that
I ever endured. It was broken by Ayesha, who addressed
herself to Leo.

' Nay, now my lord and guest,' she said in her softest
tones, which yet had the ring of steel about them, ' look
not so bashful. Surely the sight was a pretty one — ^the
leopard and the lion ! '

' Oh, hang it all ! ' said Leo in English.

' And thou, Ustane,' she went on, ' surely I should have
passed thee by had not the light fallen on the white across
thy hair,' and she pointed to the bright edge of the-
rising moon which was now appearing above the horizon.
' Well I well ! the dance is done — see, the tapers have burnt
down, and all things end in silence and in ashes. So thou
thoughtest it a fit time for love, Ustane, my servant —
and I, dreaming not that I could be disobeyed, thought
thee already far away.'

' Play not with me,' moaned the wretched woman ; ' slay
me, and let there be an end.'

' Nay, why ? It is not well to go so swift froin the hot
lips of love down to the cold mouth of the grave,' and she
made a motion to the mutes, who instantly stepped up and
caught the girl by either arm. With an oath Leo sprang
upon the nearest, and hurled him to the grcjind, and then
stood over him with his face set, and hie fist ready.

Again Ayesha laughed. ' It was well thrown, my
guest; thou hast a strong arm for on^ who so late was
sick. But now out of thy courtesy I pray thee let that man

TRIUMPH 225

live and do my bidding. He shall not harm the girl ; the
night air grows chill, and I would welcome her in mine
own place. Surely she whom thou dost favour shall be
favoured of me also.'

I took Leo by the arm, and pulled him from the
prostrate mute, and he, half bewildered, obeyed the pres-
sure. Then we all set out for the cave across the plateau,
where a pile of white human ashes was all that remained
of the fire that had lit the dancing, for the dancers had
vanished.

In due course we gained Ayesha's boudoir— all too
soon it seemed to me, having a sad presage of what was to
come lying heavy on my heart.

Ayesha seated herself upon her cushions, and, having
dismissed Job and Billah, by signs bade the mutes tend
the lamps and retire, all save one girl, who was her favour-
ite personal attendant. We three remained standing, the
unfortunate Ustane a little to the left of the rest of us.

'Now, oh Holly,' Ayesha began, 'how came it that
thou who didst hear my words bidding this evil-doer ' —
and she pointed to Ustane — ' to go from hence — thou at
whose prayer I did weakly spare her life — ^how came it,
I say, that thou wast a sharer in what I saw to-night ?
Answer, and for thine own sake, I say, speak all the truth,
for I am not minded to hear lies upon this matter ! '

' It was by accident, oh Queen,' I answered, ' I knew
naught of it.'

* I do believe thee, oh HoUy,' she answered coldly,
• and well it is for thee that I do — then does the whole
guilt rest upon her.'

' I do not find any guilt therein,' broke in Leo. ' She
is not another man's wife, and it appears that she has
married me according to the custom of this awful place,
BO who is the worse? Any way, madam,' he went on,
' whatever she has done I have done too, so if she is to
be punished let me be punished also ; and I teU thee,'
he went on, working himself up into a fury, ' that if thou
biddest one of those deaf and dumb villains to touch her

226 SHE

again I will tear him to pieces ! ' And he looked as tliongh
he meant it.

Ayesha listened in icy silence, and made no remark.
When he had finished, however, she addressed TJstane.

' Hast thou aught to say, woman ? Thou sUly straw,
thou feather, who didst think to float towards thy passion's
petty ends, even against the great wind of my will ! Tell
me, for I fain would understand. Why didst thou this
thing ? ' i

And then I think I saw the most tremendous exhibi-
tion of 'moral courage and intrepidity that it is possible to
conceive. For the poor doomed girl, knowing what she
had to expect at the hands of her terrible Queen, knowing,
too, from bitter experience how great was her adversary's
power, yet gathered herself together, and out of the very
depths of her despair drew materials to defy her.

' I did it, oh She,' she answered, drawing herself up
to the full of her stately height, and throwing back the
panther skin from her head, ' because my love is stronger
than the grave. I did it because my life without this
man whom my heart chose would be but a living death.
Therefore did I risk my life, and now that I Imow that
it is forfeit to thine anger, yet am I glad that I did risk it,
and pay it away in the risking, ay, because he embraced
me once, and told me that he loved me yet.'

Here Ayesi^a half rose from her couch, and then sank
down again. .

' I have %Q magic j' went on UstanOj her rich voice
ringing stror^^ and full, ' and I am 'not a Queen, nor
do I live for ever, but a woman's heart is heavy to
sink through waters, however deep, oh Queen! and a
woman's eyes are quick to see, even through thy veil, oh
Queen !

' Listen : I know it, thou dost love this man thyself,
and therefore wouldst thou destroy me who stand across
thy path. Ay, I die — I die, and go into the darkness,
nor know I whither I go. But this I know. There is a
light shining in my breast, and by that light, as by a lamp,

TRIUMPH 227

I see the trutli, and the future that I shall not share unroll
■ itself before me like a scroll. When first I knew my lord,'
and she pointed to Leo, ' I knew also that death would be
the bridal gift he gave me — it rushed upon nie of a sudden,
but I turned not back, being ready to pay the price, and,
behold, death is here ! And now, even as I knew that, so
do I, standing on the steps of doom, know that thou shalt
not reap the profits of thy crime. Mine he is, and, though
thy beauty shine like a sun among the stars, mine shall
he remain for thee. Never here in this hfe shall he look
thee in the eyes and call thee spouse. Thou too art
doomed, I see ' — and her voice rang like the cry of an
inspired prophetess ; ' ah, I see '

Then came an answering cry of mingled rage and
terror. I turned my head. Ayesha had risen, and was
standing with her outstretched hand pointing at Ustane,
who had suddenly stopped speaking. I gazed at the poor
woman, and as I gazed there came upoA her face that
same woful, fixed expression of terror that I had seen
once before when she had broken out into her wUd chant.
Her eyes grew large, her nostrils dilated, and her lips
blanched.

Ayesha said nothing, she made no sound, she only
drew herself up, stretched out her arm, and, her tall
veUed frame quivering like an aspen leaf, appeared to
look fixedly at her victim. Even as she did so Ustane
put her hands to her head, uttered one piercing scream,
turned round twice, and then fell backwar4s with a thud
— prone upon the floor. Both Leo and myself rushed to
her — she was stone dead — blasted into death by some
mysterious electric agency or overwhelming will-force
whereof the dread She had command.

For a moment Leo did not quite reahse what had
happened. But when he did, his face was awful to see.
With a savage oath he rose from beside the corpse,
and, turning, literally sprang at Ayesha. But she was
watching, and, seeing him come, stretched out her hand
again, and he went staggering back towards me, and

2

228 SHE

would have fallen, had I not caught him. Afterwards he
told me that he felt as though he had suddenly received a
violent blow in the chest, and, what is more, utterly cowed,
as if all the manhood had been taken out of him.

Then Ayesha spoke. ' Forgive me, my guest,' she said
softly, addressing him, ' if I have shocked thee with my
justice.'

' Forgive thee, thou fiend,' roared poor Leo, wringing
his hands in his rage and grief. ' Forgive thee, thou
murdress ! By Heaven I will kill thee if I can ! '

' Nay, nay,' she answered, in the same soft voice,
' thou dost not understand — the time has come for thee to
learn. Thou art my love, my Eallikrates, my Beautiful,
my Strong I For two thousand years, Eallikrates, have
I waited for thee, and now at length thou hast come
back to me ; and as for this woman,' pointing to the corpse,
' she stood between me and thee, and therefore have I
removed her, KaUikrates.'

' It is an accursed lie ! ' said Leo. ' My name is not
Eallikrates ! I am Leo Vincey ; my ancestor was Ealli-
krates — at least, I believe he was.'

' Ah," thou sayest it — thine ancestor was Eallikrates,
and thou, even thou, art Eallikrates reborn, come back —
and mine own dear lord ! ' - .;

' I am not Eallikrates, and as for being thy lord, or
having aught to do with thee, I had sooner be the lord of
a fiend from hell, for she would be better than thou.'

' Sayest thou so — sayest thou so, Eallikrates ? Nay,
but thou hast not seen me for so long a time that no
memory remains. Yet am I very fair, Eallikrates ! '

'I hate thee, murdress, and I have no wish to see
thee. What is it to me how fair thou art ? I hate thee,
I say.'

' Yet within a very Uttle space shalt thou creep to my
knee, and swear that thou dost love me,' answered Ayesha,
with a sweet, mocking laugh. ' Come, there is no time
like the present time, here before this dead girl who lovecl
thee, let us put it to the proof,

TRIUMPH 229

' Look now on me, Kallikrates ! ' and vsdth a sudden
motion she shook her gauzy covering from her, and stood
forth in her low kirtle and her snaky zone, in her glorious
radiant beauty and her imperial grace, rising from her
wrappings, as it were, like Venus from the wave, or
Galatea from her marble, or a beatified spirit from the
tomb. She stood forth, and fixed her deep and glow-
ing eyes upon Leo's eyes, and I saw his clenched fists
unclasp, and his set and quivering features relax beneath
her gaze. I saw his wonder and astonishment grow into
admiration, and then into fascination, and the more he
struggled the more I saw the power of her dread beauty
fasten on him and take possession of his senses, drugging
them, and drawing the heart out of him. Did I not
know the process ? Had not I, who was twice his age,
gone through it myseK? Was I not going through it
afresh even then, although her sweet and passionate gaze
was not for me ? Yes, alas, I was 1 Alas, that I should
have to confess that at that very moment I was rent
by mad and furio.us jealousy. I could have flown at
him, shame upon me 1 The woman had confounded and
almost destroyed my moral sense, as she was bound to
confound all who looked upon her superhuman loveli-
ness. But— I do not quite know how — I got the better
of myself, and once more turned to see the climax of the
tragedy.

' Oh, great Heaven 1 ' gasped Leo, ' art thou a woman ? '

' A woman in truth — in very truth— and thine own
spouse, Kallikrates 1 ' she answered, stretching out her
rounded ivory arms towards him, and smiling, ah, so
sweetly I

He looked and looked, and slowly I perceived that he
was drawing nearer to her. Suddenly his eye fell upon the
corpse of poor Ustane, and he shuddered and stopped.

' How can I ? ' he said hoarsely. ' Thou art a mur-
dress ; she loved me.'

Observe, he was already forgetting that he had loved
her.

230 SHE

' It is nauglit,' slie murmured, and her voice sounded
sweet as the night-wind passing through the trees. ' It
is naught at all. If I have sinned, let my beauty answer
for my sin. If I have sinned, it is for love of thee : let my
sin, therefore, be put away and forgotten ; ' and once more
she stretched out her arms and whispered ' Gome,' and
then in another few seconds it was over. I saw him
struggle — I saw him even turn to fly ; but her eyes drew
him more strongly than iron bonds, and the magic of her
beauty and concentrated wiU and passion entered into him
and overpowered him — ay, even there, in the presence of the
body of the woman who had loved him well enough to die
for him. It sounds horrible and wicked enough, but he
cannot be blamed too much, and be sure his sin will find
him out.- The temptress who drew him into evil was
more than human, and her beauty was greater than the
loveliness of the daughters of men,

I looked up again, and now her perfect form lay in his
arms, and her lips were pressed against his own; and
thus, with the corpse of his dead love for an altar, did Leo
Vincey plight his troth to her red-handed murdress —
plight it for ever and a day. For those who sell them-
selves into a like dominion, paying down the price of their
own honour, and throwing their soul into the balance to
sink the scale to the level of their lusts, can hope for no
deliverance here or hereafter. As they have sown, so
shall they reap and reap, even when the poppy flowers
of passion have withered in their hands, and their harvest
is but bitter tares, garnered in satiety.

Suddenly, with a snake-like motion, she seemed to slip
from his embrace, and then again broke out into her low
laugh of triumphant mockery.

' Did I not tell thee that within a little space thou
wouldst creep to my knee, oh Kallikrates ? And surely the
space has not been a great one ! '

Leo groaned in shame and misery ; for though he was
overcome and stricken do^vn, he was not so lost as to bo
unaware of the depth of the degradation to which he had

TRIUMPH 231

sunk. On the contrary, liis better nature rose up in
arms against his fallen self, as I saw clearly enough
later on.

Ayesha laughed again, and then quickly veiled herself,
and made a sign to the girl mute, who had been watching
the whole scene with curious startled eyes. The girl
left, and presently returned, followed by two male mutes,
to whom the Queen made another sign. Thereon they
all three seized the body of poor Ustane by the arms,
and dragged it heavily down the cavern and away
through the curtains at the end. Leo watched it for a
little while, and then covered his eyes with his hand,
and it too, to my excited fancy, seemed to watch us as it
went.

' There passes the dead past,' said Ayesha, solenmly,
as the curtains shook and fell back into their places, when
the ghastly procession had vanished behind them. And
then, with one of those extraordinary transitions of which
I have already spoken, she again threw off her veil, and
broke out, after the ancient and poetic fashion of the dwel-
lers in Arabia,' into a paean of triumph or epithalamium,
which, wild and beautiful as it was, is exceedingly difficult
to render iato English, and ought by rights to be sung to
the music of a cantata, rather than written and read. It
was divided into two parts — one descriptive or definitive,
and the other personal ; and, as nearly as I can remember,
ran as follows : —

Tiove is like a flower in the desert.

It is like the aloe of Arabia that blooms but once and

' Among the ancient Arabians the power of poetic declamation,
either in verse or prose, was held in the highest honour and esteem,
and he who excelled in it was known.as 'IQi^teb,' or Orator. Every
year a general assembly was held at which the rival poets repeated
their compositions, when those poems which were judged to be the
best were, so soon as the knowledge of the art of writing became
general, inscribed on silk in letters of gold, and pubUcly exhibited,
being known as ' Al Modhahab^t,' or golden verses. In the poem
given above by Mr. HoUy, Ayesha evidently followed the traditional
poetic manner of her people, which was to embody their thoughts in
a series of somewhat disconnected sentences, each remarkable for
its beauty and the grace of its expression. — Editob.

232 SHE

dies; it blooms in the salt emptiness of Life, and the
brightness of its beauty is set upon the waste as a star
is set upon a storm.

It hath the sun above that is the spirit, and above it
blows the air of its d/ivirdty.

At the echoing of a step. Love blooms, I say ; I say
Love blooms, and bends her beauty d-cnon to him who
passeth by.

HephioTceth it, yea, hepluclceth the red cup that is full
of honey, and beareth it away ; awa/y across th-e desert,
away till the flower be withered, a/wa/y till the desert be
done.

There is only one perfect flower in the wilderness of
Life.

That flower is Love !

There is only one fixed star in the mists of our wan-
dering.

That star is Love I

There is only one hope in our despairing night.

That hope is Love !

All else is false. All else is shadow moving upon water.
All else is wind and vanity.

Who shall say what is the weight or the measure of
Love ?

It is born of tiie flesh, it dwelleth in the spirit. From
each doth it dram its comfort.

For beauty it is as a star.

Many a/re its shapes, but all are beautiful, and none
know where the star rose, or the horizon where it shall set.

Then, turning to Leo, and laying her hand upon his
shoulder, she went on in a fuller and more triumphant
tone, speaking in balanced sentences that gradually grew
and swelled from idealised prose into pure and majestic
verse : —

Long have I loved thee, oh, my love ; yet has my love
not lessened.

Long have I waited for thee, and behold my reward is
at hand — is here!

TRIUMPH 2.33

Far away I saw thee once, and thou wast taken from
me.

Then in a grave sowed I the seed of patience, and shone
upon it with the sun of hope, and watered it with tears of
repentance, and breathed on it with the breath of my know-
ledge. And now, lof it hath sprung up, and borne fruit.
Lo 1 out of the grave hath it sprung. Yea, from among
the d/ry hones and ashes of the dead.

I have waited and my reward is with me.

I have overcome Death, and Death brought hack to v:e
him that was dead.

Therefore do I rejoice, for fair is the future.

Green are the paths that we shall tread across the ever-
lasting meadows.

Tlie Iwur is at hand. Night hath fled away into the
valleys.

The dawn kisseth the mountain tops.

Soft shall we lie, my love, and easy shall we go.

Crowned shall we be with the diadem of Kings.

Worshipping and wonder struck all peoples of the world.

Blinded shall fall before our beauty and our might.

From time unto times shall our greatness thunder on,

Boiling like a chariot through the du^t of endless days.

Laughing shall we speed in our victory and pomp.

Laughing like the Daylight as he leaps along the hills.

Onward, still triumphant to a triumph ever new 1

Onward, in our power to a power unattained!

Onward, never weary, clad ivith splendour for a robe !

Till accomplished be our fate, and the night is rushing
doivn.

She paused in her strange and most thrilling allegorical
chant, of which I am, unfortunately^ only able to give the
burden, and that feebly enough, and then said —

' Perchance thou dost not believe my word, Kallikrates
— perchance thou thinkest that I do delude thee, and that
I have not lived these many years, and that thou hast not
been born again to me. Nay, look not so — put away that
pale cast of doubt, for oh be sure herein can error find no

234 . SHE ■ -

foothold ! Sooner shall the suns forget their course and
the swallow miss her nest, than my soul shall swear a lie
and he led astray from thee, Kallikrates. Blind me, tal:e
away mine eyes, and let the darkness utterly fence me in,
and still mine ears would catch the tone of thine mifor-
gotten voice, striking more loud against the portals of my
sense than can the call of brazen-throated clarions : —
stop up mine hearing also, and let a thousand touch me
on the brow, and I would name thee out of all : — yea, rob
me of every sense, and see me stand deaf and "blind, and
dumb, and with nerves that cannot weigh the value of a
touch, yet would my spirit leap within me like a quickening
child and cry unto my heart, behold Kallikrates ! behold,
thou watcher, the watches of thy night are ended ! behold
thou who seekest in the night season, thy morning Star
ariseth.'

She paused awhile and then continued, ' But stay, if
thy heart is yet hardened against the mighty truth and
thou dost require a further pledge of that which thou dost
find too deep to understand, even now shall it be given to
thee, and to thee also, oh my Holly. Bear each one of
you a lamp, and follow after me whither I shall lead you.'

Without stopping to thint — ^indeed, speaMngfor myself,
I had almost abandoned the function in circumstances
under which to think seemed to be absolutely useless,
since thought fell hourly helpless against a black wall of
wonder — ^we took the lamps and followed her. Going to
the end of her ' boudoir,' she raised a curtain and revealed
a little stair of the sort that was so common in these dim
caves of Kor. As we hurried down the stair I observed
that the steps were worn in the centre to such an extent
that some of them had been reduced from seven and a
half inches, at which I guessed their original height, to
about three and a half. Now, all the other steps that
I had seen in the caves had been practically unworn, as
was to ' 3 expected, seeing that the only traffic which ever
passed upon them was that of those who bore a fresh
burden to the tomb.' Therefore this fact struct my notice

TRIUMPH 235

with that curious force with which httle things do strike us
when our minds are absolutely overwhelmed by a sudden
rush of powerful sensations ; beaten flat, as it were, like a
sea beneath the first burst of a hurricane, so that every
little object on the surface starts into an unnatural pro-
minence.

At the bottom of the staircase I stood and stared at the
worn steps, and Ayesha, turning, saw me.

'Wonderest thou whose are the feet that have worn
away the rock, my Holly ? ' she asked. ' They are mine —
even mine own light feet ! I can remember when these
stairs were fresh and level, but for two thousand years and
more have I gone down hither day by day, and see, my
sandals have worn out the solid rock ! '

I made no answer, but I do not think that anything
that I had heard or seen brought home to my limited
understanding so clear a sense of this being's overwhelming
antiquity asihat hard rock hollowed out by her soft white
feet. How many millions of times must she have passed
up and down that stair to bring about such a result ?

The stair led to a tunnel, and a few paces down the
tunnel was one of the usual curtain-hung doorways, a
glance at which told me that it was the same where I had
been a witness of that terrible scene by the leaping flame.
I recognised the pattern of the curtain, and the sight of it
brought the whole event vividly before my eyes, and made
me tremble even at its memory. Ayesha entered the
tomb (for it was a tomb), and we followed her — I, for one,
rejoicing that the mystery of the place was about to be
cleared up, and yet afraid to face its solution.

#

235 SHE

XXI.

THE DEAD AND LIVINO MEET.

' See now the place where I have slept for these two thou-
sand years,' said Ayesha, taking the lamp from Leo's hand
and holdiQg it above her head. Its rays fell upon a little
hollow in the floor, where I had seen the leaping flame,
but the fire was out now. They fell upon the white form
stretched there beneath its wrappings upon its bed of
stone, upon the fretted carving of the tomb, and upon
another shelf of stone opposite the one on which the body
lay, and separated from it by the breadth of the cave.

' Here,' went on Ayesha, laying her hand upon the
rock — ' here have I slept night by night for all these gene-
rations, with but a cloak to cover me. It did not become
me that I should he soft when my spouse yonder,' and she
pointed to the rigid form, ' lay stiff in death. Here night
by night have I slept in his cold company — till, thou seest,
this thick slab, like the stairs down which we passed, has
worn thin with the tossing of my form — so faithful have I
been to thee even in thy space of sleep, KaUikrates. And
now, mine own, thou shalt see a wonderful thing — hving,
thou shalt behold thyself dead — for well have I tended
thee during all these years, KaUikrates. Art thou pre-
pared ? '

We made no answer, but gazed at each other with
frightened eyes, the whole scene was so dreadful and so
solemn. A.yesha advanced, and laid her hand upon the
comer of the shroud, and once more spokcL

' Be not affrighted,' she said ; ' though the thing seem
wonderful to thee — all we who live have thus lived before ;
nor is the very shape that holds us a stranger to the sun I

THE DEAD AND LIVING MEET 237

Only we know it not, because memory writes no record,
and earth hath gathered ia the earth she lent us, for none
have saved our glory from the grave. But I, by my arts
and by the arts of those dead men of K6r which I have
learned, have held thee back, oh Kallikrates, from the
dust, that the waxen stamp of beauty on thy face should
ever rest before mine eye. 'Twas a mask that memory
might fill, serving to fashion out thy presence from the
past, and give it strength to wander in the habitations of
my thought, clad in a mummery of life that stayed my
appetite with visions of dead days.

' Behold now, let the Dead and Living meet ! Across
the gulf of Time they still are one. Time hath no power
against Identity, though sleep the merciful hath blotted
out the tablets of our mind, and with oblivion sealed
the sorrows that else would hound us from life to life,
stuffing the brain with gathered griefs till it burst in the
madness of uttermost despair. Still are they one, for the
wrappings of our sleep shall roll away as thunder clouds
before the wind ; the frozen voices of the past shall melt
in music like mountain snows beneath the sun ; and the
weeping and the laughter of the lost hours shall be heard
once more most sweetly echoing up the cliffs of immeasur-
able time.

• Ay, the sleep shall roll away, and the voices shall be
heard, when down the completed chain, whereof our each
existence is a link, the lightning of the Spirit hath passed
to work out the purpose of our being ; quickening and
fusing those separated days of life, and shaping them to,
a staff whereon we may safely lean as we wend to our
appointed fate.

' Therefore, have no fear, Kallikrates, when thou —
living, and but lately born — shalt look upon thine own
departed self, who breathed- and died so long ago. I do
but turn one page in thy Book of Being, and show thee
what is writ thereon.

'Behold!' ' '

With a sudden motion she drew the shroud from the

233 SHE

cold form, and let the lampUght play upon it, I looked,
and then shrank back terrified ; since, say what she might
in explanation, the sight was an Tineanny one — ^for her
explanations were beyond the grasp of our finite minds,
and when they were stripped from the mists of vague
esoteric, philosophy, and brought into conflict with the
cold and horrifying fact, did not do much to break its
force. For there, stretched upon the stone bier before us,
robed in white and perfectly preserved, was what appeared
to be the body of Leo Vincey. I stared from Leo, stand-
ing there alive, to Leo lying there dead, and could see
no difference ; except, perhaps, that the body on the bier
looked older. Feature for feature they were the same,
even down to the crop of little golden curls, which was
Leo's most uncommon beauty. It even seemed to me, as
I looked, that the expression on the dead man's face
resembled that which I had sometimes seen upon Leo's
when he was plunged into profound sleep. I can only sum
up the closeness of the resemblance by sajdng that I never
saw twins so exactly similar as that dead and living pair.

I turned to see what effect was produced, upon Leo by
this sight of his dead self, and found it to be one of partial
stupefaction. He stood for two or three minutes staring
and said nothing, and when at last he spoke it was only to
ejaculate —

' Cover it up and take me away.'

' Nay, wait, KaUikrates,' said Ayesha, who, standing
with the lamp raised above her head, flooding with its
light her own rich beauty and the cold wonder of the
death-clothed form upon the bier, resembled an inspired
Sibyl rather than a woman, as she rolled out her majestic
sentences with a grandeur and a freedom of utterance
which I am, alas ! quite unable to reproduce.

' Wait ; I would show thee something, that no tittle of
my crime may be hidden from thee. Do thou, oh Holly,
open the garment on the breast of the dead KaUikrates,
for perchance my lord may fear to touch himseK.'

I obeyed with trembling hands. It seemed a desecra-

THE DEAD AND LIVING MEET 239

tion and an unhallowed thing to touch that sleeping image
of the Hve man by my side. Presently his broad chest
was bare, and there upon it, right over the heart, was a
wound, evidently inflicted with a spear.

' Thou seest, Kallikrates,' she said. ' Know then that
it was I who slew thee : in the Place of Life J gave thee
death. I slew thee because of the Egyptian Amenartas,
whom, thou didst love, for by her wiles she held thy heart,
and her I could not smite as but now I smote the woman,
for she was too strong for me. In my haste and Wtter
anger I slew thee, and now for all these days have I la-
mented thee, and waited for thy coming. And thou hast
come, and none can stand between thee and me, and of a
truth now for death I will give thee life — not life eternal,
for that none can give, but life and youth that shall endure
for thousands upon thousands of years, and with it pomp,
and power, and wealth, and all things that are good and
beautiful, such as have been to no man before thee, nor
shall be to any man who comes after. And now one thing
more, and thou shalt rest and make ready for the day of
thy new birth. Thou seest this body, which was thine
own. For all these centuries it hath been my cold cOmfort
and my companion, but now I need it no more, for I have
thy hving presence, and it can but serve to stir up memo-
ries of that which I would fain forget. Let it therefore go
back to the dust from which I held it.

' Behold 1 I have prepared against this happy hour I '
and going to the other shelf, or stone ledge, which, she
said, had served her for a bed, she took from it a large
vitrified double-handed vase, the mouth of which was
tied up with a bladder. This she loosed, and then, having
bent down and gently kissed the white forehead of the
dead man, she undid the vase, and sprinkled its contents
carefully over the form, taking, I observed, the greatest
precautions against any drop of them touching us or her-
self, and then poured out what remained of the liquid
upon the chest and head. Instantly a dense vapour arose,
and the cave was filled with choking fumes that prevented

240 SHE

us from seeing anything while the deadly acid (for I pre-
sume it was some tremendous preparation of that sort) did
its work. From the spot where the body lay came a fierce
fizzing and cracking sound, which ceased, however, before
the fumes had cleared away. At last they were all gone,
except a little cloud that still hung over the corpse. In
a couple of minutes more this too had vanished, and,
wonderful as it may seem, it is a fact that on the stone
bench that had supported the mortal remains of the ancient
KalUkrates for so many centuries there was now nothing to
be seen but a few handfuls of smoking white powder. The
acid had utterly destroyed the body, and even in places
eaten into the stone. Ayesha stooped down, and, taking a
handful of this powder in her grasp, threw it into the air,
saying at the same time, in a voice of calm solemnity —

' Dust to dust ! — the past to the past ! — the dead to the
dead ! — Kallikrates is dead, and is born again 1 '

The ashes floated noiselessly to the rocky floor, and we
stood in awed silence and watched them faU, too overcome
for words.

' Now leave me,' she said, ' and sleep if ye may. I
must watch and think, for to-morrow night we go hence,
and the time is long since I trod the path that we must
folio 7..'

4^ordihgly we bowed, and left her.

A% we paissed to our own apartment I peeped into Job's
sleeping place, to see how he fared, for he had gone away
just before our interview with the murdered Ustane, quite
prostrated by the terrors of the Amahagger festivity. He
was sleeping soundly, good honest fellow that he was, and
I rejoiced to think that his nerves, which, like those of
most uneducated people, were far from strong, had been
spared the closing scenes of this dreadful day. Then we
entered our own chamber, and here at last poor Leo, who,
ever since he had looked upon that frozen image of his
living self, had been in a state not far removed from
stupefaction, burst out into a torrent of grief. Now that
he was no longer in the presence of the dread She, his

THE DEAD AND LIVING MEET 241

sense of the awfulness of all that had happened, and more
especially of the wicked murder of Ustane, who was hound
to him hy ties so close, broke upon him like a storm, and
lashed him into an agony of remorse and terror which was
painful to witness. He cursed himself — ^he cursed the hour
when we had first, seen the writing on the sherd, which
was being so mysteriously verified, and bitterly he cursed
his own weakness. Ayesha he dared not curse — who
dared speak evil of such a woman, whose consciousness for
aught we knew was watching us at the very moment ?

' What am I to do, old fellow ? ' he groaned, resting
his head against my shoulder in the extremity of his grief.
' I let her be killed — not that I could help that, but within
five minutes I was kissing her murdress over her body.
I am a degraded brute, but I cannot resist that ' (and here
his voice sank) — ' that awful sorceress. I know I shall do
it again to-morrow; I know that I am in her power for
always ; if I never saw her again 1 should never think of
anybody else during all my life ; I must follow her as a
needle follows a magnet ; I would not go away now if I
could ; I could not leave her, my legs would not carry me,
but my mind is still clear enough, and in my mind I hate
her — at least, I think so. It is all so horrible ; and that
— that body ! What can I make of it ? It was «ie f , I''
am sold • into bondage, old fellow, and she will t'ak& jny
soul as the price of herseK ! ' ^ -^ ■, ■ ?

Then, for the first time, I told him that I was iii a but
very little better position ; and I am bound to say that,
notwithstanding his own infatuation, he had the decency
to sympathise with me. Perhaps he did not think it worth
while being jealous, realising that he had no cause so far as
the lady was concerned. I went on to suggest that we should
try to run away, but we soon rejected the project as futile,
and, to be perfectly honest, I do not believe that either of
us would really have left Ayesha even if some superior
power had suddenly offered to convey us from these gloomy
caves and set us down in Cambridge. AVe could no more
have left her than a moth can leave the light that destroys

242 SHE

it. We were like confirmed opium-eaters : in oni moments
of reason we well knew the deadly nature of our pursuit,
but we certainly were not prepared to abandon its terrible
delights.

No man who once had seen She unveiled, and heard
the music of her voice, and drunk in the bitter wisdom of
her words, would willingly give up the sight for a whole
sea of placid joys. How much more, then, was this Hkely
to be so when, as in Leo's case, to put myself out of the
question, this extraordinary creature declared her utter and
absolute devotion, and gave yhat appeared to be proofs of
its having lasted for some two thousand years ?

No doubt she was a wicked person, and no doubt she
had murdered Ustane when she stood in her path, but
then she was very faithful, and by a law of nature man is
apt to think but lightly of a woman's crimes, especially if
that woman be beautiful, and the crime be committed for
the love of him.

And then for the rest, when had such a chance ever
come to a man before as that which now lay in Leo's
hand ? True, in uniting himself to this dread woman, he
would place his life under the influence of a mysterious
creature of evil tendencies,' but then that would be likely

' After some months of consideration of this statement I am
bomicT to confess that I am not quite satisfied of its truth. It is per-
fectly true that Ayesha committed a murder, but I shrewdly suspect
that, were we endowed with the same absolute power, and if we had
the same tremendous interest at stake, we should be very apt to do
likewise under parallel circumstances. Also, it must be remembered
that she looked on it as an execution for disobedience under a system
which made the slightest disobedience punishable by death. Putting
aside this question of the murder, her evil-doing resolves itself into
the expression of views and the acknowledgment of motives which are
contrary to our preaching if not to our practice. Now at first sight
this might be fairly taken as a proof of an evil nature, but when we
come to consider the great antiquity of the individual it becomes
doubtful if it was anything more than the natural cynicism which
arises from age and bitter experience, and the possession of extra-
ordinary powers of observation. It is a well-known fact that very
often, putting the period of boyhood out of the question, the older
we grow the more cynical and hardened we get, indeed many of us
are only saved by timely death from utter moral petrifaction if not
moral corruption. No one will deny that a young man is on the

THE DEAD AND LIVING MEET 243

enough to happen to him in any ordinary marriage. On
the other hand, however, no ordinary marriage could hring
him such awful beauty— for awful is the only word that can
describe it — such divine devotion, such wisdom, and com-
mand over the secrets of nature, and- the place and power
that they must win, or lastly the royal crown of unending
youth, if indeed she could give that. No, on the whole, it
is not wonderful that though Leo was plunged in bitter
shame and grief, such as any gentleman would have felt
under the circumstances, he was not ready to entertain the
idea of running away from his extraordinary fortune.

My own opinion is that he would have been mad if he
had done so. But then I confess that my statement on
the matter must be accepted with qualifications. I am in
love with Ayesha myself to this day, and I would rather
have been the object of her affection for one short week
than that of any other woman in the world for a whole
lifetime. And let me add that if anybody who doubts
this statement, and thinks me foolish for making it, could
have seen Ayesha draw her veil and flash out in beauty on
his gaze, his view would exactly coincide with my own.
Of course, I am speaking of any man. We never had the
advantage of a lady's opinion of Ayesha, but I think it
quite possible that she would have regarded the Queen
with dislike, would have expressed her disapproval in some
more or less pointed manner, and ultimately have got
herself blasted.

For two hours or more Leo and I sat with shaken

average better than an old one, for he is witliout that experience
of the order of things that in certain thoughtful dispositions can
hardly fail to prodnoe cynicism, and that disregard of acknowledged
methods and established custom which we call evil. Now the oldest
man upon the earth was but a babe compared to Ayesha, and the wisest
man upon the earth was not one-third as wise. And the fruit of her
wisdom was this, that there was but one thing worth living for, and'
that was Love in its highest sense, and to gain that good thing she
was not prepared to stop at trifles. This is really the sum of her evil
doings, and it must be remembered on the other hand that whatever
may be thought of them she had some virtues developed to a degree
very uncommon in either sex— constancy, for instance. — L. H. H.

K2

244 SHE

nerves and frightened eyes, and talked over the miracu-
lous events through which we were passing. It seemed
like a dream or a fairy tale, instead of the solemn, sober
fact. Wlio would have beHeved that the writing on the
potsherd was not only true, but that we should live to
verify its truth, and that we two seekers should find her
who was sought, patiently awaiting our coming in the
tombs of Kor ? Who would have thought that in the
person of Leo this mysterious woman should, as she
believed, discover the being whom she awaited from cen-
tury to century, and whose former earthly habitation she
had till this very night preserved? But so it was. In
the face of all we had seen it was difficult for us as
ordinary reasoning men any longer to doubt its truth, and
therefore at last, with humble hearts and a deep sense of
the impotence of human knowledge, and the insolence of
its assumption that denies that which it has no experience
of to be possible, we laid ourselves down to sleep, leaving
our fates in the hands of that watching Providence which
had thus chosen to allow us to draw the veil of human
ignorance, and reveal to us for good or evil some glimpse
of the possibilities of life.

24S

XXII.

JOB HAS A PEESENTIMENT.

It was nine o'clock on the following morning when Job,
who still looked scared and frightened, came in to call me,
and at the same time breathe his gratitude at finding us
alive in our beds, which it appeared was more than he had
expected. When I told him of the awful end of poor
Ustane he was even more grateful at our survival, and
much shocked, though Ustane had been no favourite of
his, or he of hers, for the matter of that. She called him
' pig ' in bastard Arabic, and he called her ' hussy ' in good
English, but these amenities were forgotten in the face of
the catastrophe that had overwhelmed her at the hands of
her Queen.

' I don't want to say anything as mayn't be agreeable,
sir,' said Job, when he had finished exclaiming at my tale,
' but it's my opinion that that there She is the old gentle-
man himself, or perhaps his wife, if he has one, which I
suppose he has, for he couldn't be so wicked aU by him-
self. The Witch of Endor was a fool to her, sir : bless
you, she would make no more of raising every gentleman
in the Bible out of these here beastly tombs than I should
of growing cress on an old flannel. It's a country of
devils, this is, sir, and she's the master one of the lot ; and
if ever we get out of it it will be more than I expect to do.
I don't see no way out of it.- That witch isn't likely to let
a fine young man like Mr. Leo go.'

' Come,' I said, ' at any rate she saved his life.'
' YeSj; and shell -take his soul tq. pay for it. She'll
make him' a witch, like herself. I say it^s wicked to have

246 SHE

anything to do with those sort of people. Last night, sir,
I lay awake and read in my little Bible that my poor old
mother gave me about what is going to happen to sor-
ceresses and them sort till my hair stood on end. Lord,
how the old lady would stare if she saw where her Job had
got to ! '

' Yes, it's a queer country, and a queer people too,
Job,' I answered, with a sigh, for, though I am not super-
stitious Hke Job, I admit to a natural shrinking (which
will not bear investigation) from the things that are above
Nature.

' You are right, sir,' he answered, ' and if you won't
think me very foolish, I should Hke to say something to
you now that Mr. Leo is out of the way ' — (Leo had got up
early and gone for a stroll) — ' and that is that I know it is
the last country as ever I shall see in this world. I had a
dream last night, and I dreamed that I saw my old father
with a kind of night-shirt on him, something Uke these
folks wear when they want to be in particular full-dress^
and a bit of that feathery grass in his hand, which he may
have gathered on the way, for I saw lots of it yesterday
about three hundred yards from the mouth of this beastly
cave.

* " Job," he said to me, solemn like, and yet with a
kind of satisfaction shining through him, more Hke a
Methody parson when he has sold a neighbour a marked
horse for a sound one and cleared twenty pounds by the
job than anything I can think on — " Job, time's up, Job ;
but I never did expect to have to come and hunt you out
in this 'ere place. Job. Such ado as I have had to nose
you up ; it wasn't friendly to give your poor old father
such a run, let alone that a wonderful lot of bad characters
hail from this place K6r." '

'Eegular cautions,' I suggested.

' Yes, sir — of course, sir, that's just what he said they
was — " cautions, downright scorchers " — sir, and I'm sure I
don't doubt it, seeing what I know of them and their hot-
potting ways,' went on Job, sadly. ' Anyway, he was sure

JOB HAS A PRESENTIMENT 247

that time was up, and went away saying that we should
see more than we cared for of each other soon, and I
suppose he was a-thinking of the fact that father and I
never could hit it off' together for longer nor three days,
and I dare say that things will be similar when we meet
again.'

' Surely,' I said, ' you don't think that you are gomg
to die because you dreamed you saw your old father ; if
one dies because one dreams of one's father, what happens
to a man who dreams of his mother-in-law ? '

• Ah, sir, you're laughing at. me,' said Job ; ' but, you
see, you didn't know my old father. If it had been any-
body else — my Amit Mary, for instance, who never made
much of a job — I should not have thought so much of it ;
but my father was that idle, which he shouldn't have been
vnth seventeen children, that he would never have put
himself out to come here just to see the place. No, sir ; I
know that he meant business. Well, sir, I can't help it ;
I suppose every man must go some time or other, though
it is a hard thing to die in a place like this, where
Christian burial isn't to be had for its weight in gold.
I've tried to be a good man, sir, and do my duty honest,
and if it wasn't for the supereilus kind of way in which
father carried on last night — a sort of sniffing at me as it
were, as though he hadn't no opinion of my references
and testimonials — I should feel easy enough in my mind.
Any way, sir, I've been a good servant to you and Mr.
Leo, bless him 1 Why, it seems but the other day that I
used to lead him about the streets with a penny whip ;
and if ever you get out of this place — which, as father
didn't allude to you, perhaps you may — I hope you will
think kindly of my whitened bones, and never have any-
thing more to do with Greek writing on flower-pots, sir,
if I may make so bold as to say so.'

' Come, come. Job,' I said seriously, ' this is all non-
sense, you know. You mustn't be silly enough to go
getting such ideas into your head. We've lived through
some queer things, and I hope that we may go on doing so.'

248 SHE

' No, sir,' answered Job, in a tone of conviction that
jarred on me unpleasantly, ' it isn't nonsense. I'm a
doomed man, and I feel it, and a wonderful uncomfortable
feeling it is, sir, for one can't help wondering how it's
going to come about. If you are eating your dinner you
think of poison and it goes against your stomach, and
if you are walking along these dark rabbit-burrows you
think of knives, and Lord, don't you just shiver about the
back ! I ain't particular, sir, provided it's sharp, Hke that
poor girl, who, now that she's gone, I am sorry to have
spoke hard on, though I don't approve of her morals in
getting married, which I consider too quick to be decent.
Still, sir,' and poor Job turned a shade paler as he said
it, ' I do hope it won't be that hot-pot game.'
' Nonsense,' I broke in angrily, ' nonsense ! '
' Very weU, sir,' said Job, ' it isn't my place to differ
from you, sir, but if you happen to be going anywhere,
sir, I should be obliged if you could manage to take me
with you, seeing that I shall be glad to have a friendly
face to look at when the time comes, just to help on«
through, as it were. And now, sir, I'll be getting che
breakfast,' and he went, leaving me in a very uncom-
fortable state of mind. I was deeply attached to old Job,
who was one of the best and honestest men I have ever
had to do vrith in any class of Ufe, and really more of a
friend than a servant, and the mere idea of anything
happening to him brought a lump into my throat. Beneath
all his ludicrous talk I could see that he himseK was quite
convinced that something was going to happen, and
though in most eases these convictions turn out to be
utter moonshine — and this particular one especially was to
be amply accounted for by the gloomy and unaccustomed
surroundings in which its victim was placed — still it did
more or less carry a ehUl to my heart, as any dread that is
obviously a genuine object of belief is apt to do, how-
ever absurd the beUef may be. Presently the breakfast
arrived, and with it Leo, who had been taking a walk outside
the cave— to clear his mind, ])c said — and very glad I was

JOB HAS A PRESENTIMENT 249

to see both, for they gave me a respite from my gloomy
thoughts. After breakfast we ■went for another walk, and
watched some of the Amahaggor sowing a plot of ground
with the grain from which they make their beer. This
they did in scriptural fashion — a man with a bag made of
goat's-hide fastened round his waist walking up and down
the plot and scattering the seed as he went. It was a
positive relief to see one of these dreadful people do any-
thing so homely and pleasant as sow a field, perhaps
because it seemed to link them, as it wore, with the rest
of humanity.

As we were returnifig BUlali met us, and informed us
that it was ./S/ic's pleasure that we should wait upon her,
and accordingly we entered her presence, not without
trepidation, for Ayesha was certainly an exception to the
rule. Famiharity with her might and did breed passion
and wonder and horror, but it certainly did not breed
contempt.

We were as usual shown in by the mutes, and after
these had retired Ayesha unveiled, and once more bade
Leo embrace her, which, notwithstanding his heart-
searchings of the previous night, he did with more alacrity
and fervour than in strictness courtesy required.

She laid her white hand on his head, and looked him
fondly in the eyes. ' Dost thou wonder, my Kalhkrates,'
she said, ' when thou shalt call me all thine own, and when
we shall of a truth be for one another and to one another ?
I will teU thee. First, must thou be even as I am, not
immortal indeed, for that I am not, but so cased and
hardened against the attacks of Time that his arrows
shall glance from the armour of thy vigorous life as the
sunbeams glance from water. As yet I may not mate
with thee, for thou and I are different, and the very
brightness of my being would burn thee up, and perchance
destroy thee. Thou couldst not even endure to look upon
me for too long a time lest thine eyes should ache, and
thy senses swim, and therefore (vnth a little coquettish
ijod) shall I presently veil myself again,' (This by the

250 SHE

-w&y she did not do.) ' No : listen, tliou shalt not be tried
beyond endurance, for this very evening, an hour before
the sun goes down, shall we start hence, and by to-
morrow's dark, if all goes well, and the road is. not lost
to me, which I pray it may not be, shall we stand in the
place of Life, and thou shalt bathe in the fire, and come
forth glorified, as no man ever was before thee, and then,
Kallikrates, shalt thou call me wife, and I will call thee
husband.' '

Leo muttered something in answer to this astonishing
statement, I do not know what, and she laughed a little at
his confusion, and went on.

' And thou, too, oh Holly ; on thee also will I confer
this boon, and then of a truth shalt thou be an evergreen
tree, and this will I do — well, because thou hast pleased
me. Holly, for thou art not altogether a fool, like most of
the sons of men, and because, though thou hast a school
of philosophy as fuU of nonsense as those of the old days,
yet hast thou not forgotten how to turn a pretty phrase
about a lady's eyes.'

' HuUoa, old fellow ! ' whispered Leo, with a return of
his old cheerfulness, ' have you been paying compliments ?
I should never have thought it of you ! '

'I thank thee, oh Ayesha,' I replied, with as much
dignity as I could command, ' but if there be such a place
as thou dost describe, and if in this strange place there
may be found a fiery virtue that can hold off Death when
he. comes to pluck us by the hand, yet would I none of
it. For me, oh Ayesha, the world has not proved so soft
a nest that I would he in it for ever. A stony-hearted
mother is our earth, and stones are the bread she gives
her children for their daily food. Stones to eat and bitter
water for their thirst, and stripes for tender nm-ture.
Who would endure this for many lives ? Who would so
load up his back with memories of lost hours and loves,
and of his neighbour's sorrows that he cannot lessen, and
wisdom that brings not consolation? Hard is it to die,
because our delicate flesh doth shrink back from the worm

JOB HAS A PRESENTIMENT 251

it will not feel, and from that unlmown wbich the winding-
sliest doth curtain from our view. But harder still, to my
fancy, would it be to live on, green in the leaf and fair,
but dead and rotten at the core, and feel that other secret
worm of recollection gnawing ever at the heart.'

' Bethink thee. Holly,' she said ; ' yet doth long life
and strength and beauty beyond measure mean power and
all things that are dear to man.'

' And what, oh Queen,' I answered, ' are those things
that are dear to man ? Are they not bubbles ? Is not
ambition but an endless ladder by which no height is ever
cHmbed till the last unreachable rung is mounted ? For
height leads on to height, and there is no resting-place
upon them, and rung doth grow upon rung, and there is
no Hniit to the number. Doth not wealth satiate and
become nauseous, and no longer serve to satisfy or
pleasure, or to buy an hour's ease of mind ? And is
there any end to wisdom that we may hope to reach it ?
Eather, the more we learn shall we not thereby be able
only to better compass out our ignorance ? Did we live
ten thousand years could we hope to solve the secrets of
the suns, and of the space beyond the suns, and of the
Hand that hung them in the heavens ? Would not our
wisdom be but as a gnavping hunger calling our conscious-
ness day by day to a knowledge of the empty craving of
our souls ? Would it not be but as a light in one of these
great caverns, that though bright it burn, and brighter
yet, doth but the more serve to show the depths of the
gloom around it ? And what good thing is there beyond
that we may gain by length of days ? '

• Nay, my HoUy, there is love — love which makes all
things beautiful, and doth breathe divinity into the very
dust we tread. With love shall life roll gloriously on
from year to year, like the voice of some great music that
hath power to hold the hearer's heart poised on eagle's
wings above the sordid shame and foUy of the earth.'

' It may be so,' I answered ; ' but if the loved one
prove a broken reed to pierce us, or if the love be loved in

252 SHE

vain — what then ? Shall a man grave his sorrows upon
a stone when he hath but- need to write them on the
water ? Nay, oh Bh,a, I will Hve my day and grow old
'with my generation, and die my appointed death, and be
forgotten. For I do hope for an immortahty to which the
little span that perchance thou canst confer will be but
as a finger's length laid against the measure of the great
world ; and, mark this ! the immortality to which I look,
and which my faith doth promise to me, shall be free
from the bonds that here must tie my spirit down. For,
while the flesh endures, sorrow and evil and the scorpion
whips of sin must endure also ; but when the flesh hath
fallen from us, then shall the spirit shine forth clad in the
brightness of eternal good, and for its common air shall
breathe so rare an ether of most noble thoughts, that the
highest aspiration of our manhood, or the purest incense
of a maiden's prayer, would prove too earthly gross to float
therein.'

'Thou lookest high,' answered Ayesha, with a little
laugh, ' and speakest clearly as a trumpet and with no
uncertain sound. And yet methinks that but now didst
thou talk of "that Unknown" from which the wiiiding-
sheet doth curtain us. But perchance, thou seest with
the eye of Faith, gazing on this brightness that is to be,
through the paiated-glass of thy imagination. Strange
are the pictures of the future that mankind can thus
draw with this brush of faith and this many-coloured
pigment of imagination! Strange, too, that no one of
them doth agree with another ! I could tell thee — but
there, what is the use ? why rob a fool of his bauble ?
Let it pass, and I pray, oh Holly, that when thou dost feel
old age creeping slowly toward thyself, and the con-
fusion of senility making havoc in thy brain, thou mayest
not bitterly regret that thou didst cast away the imperial
boon I would have given to thee. But so it hath ever
been ; man can never be content with that which his hand
can pluck. If a lamp be in his reach to light him through
the darkness, he must needs cast it down because it is

JOB HAS A PRESENTIMENT 253

no star. Happiness danceth ever a pace before him, like
tile marsh-fires in the swamps, and he must catch the fire,
and he must hold the star ! Beauty is naught to him,
because there are lips more honey-sweet; and wealth is
naught, because others can weigh him down with heavier
shekels ; and fame is naught, because there have been
greater men than he. Thyself thou saidst it, and I turn
thy words against thee. Well, thou dreamest that thou
shalt pluck the star. I believe it not, and I think thee a
fool, my Holly, to throw away the lamp.'

I made no answer, for I could not — especially before
Leo — tell her that since I had seen her face I knew that
it would always be before my eyes, and that I had no
wish to prolong an existence which must always be
haunted and tortured by her memory, and by the last
bitterness of unsatisfied love. But so it was, and so,
alas, is it to this hour !

' And now,' went on She, changing her tone and the
subject together, ' tell me, my Kallikrates, for as yet I"^
know it not, how came ye to seek me here ? Yesternight
thou didst say that Kallikrates — him whom thou sawest —
was thine ancestor. How was it? Tell me — thou dost
not speak overmuch ! '

Thus adjured, Leo told her the wonderful story of the
casket and of the potsherd that, written on by his an-
cestress, the Egyptian Amenartas, had been the means of
guiding us to her. Ayesha listened intently, and, when he
had finished, spoke to me.

' Did I not tell thee one day, when we did talk of good
and evil, oh Holly — it was when my beloved lay so ill —
that out of good came evil, and out of evil good — that they
who sowed knew not what the crop should be, nor he who
struck where the blow should fall ? See, now : this Egyp-
tian Amenartas, this royal child of the Nile who hated me,
and whom even now I hate, for in a way she did prevail
against me — see, now, she herself hath been the very means
to bring her lover to mine arras ! For her sake I slew himi
and now, behold, through her he hath come back to me 1

254 SHE

She would have done me evil, and sowed her seeds that I
might reap tares, and behold she hath given me more than
all the world can give, and there is a strange square for thee
to fit into thy circle of good and evil, oh HoUy !

' And so,' she went on after a pause^-' and so she bade
her son destroy me if he might, because I slew his father.
And thou, my KaUikrates, art the father, and in a sense
thou art Ukewise the son ; and wouldst thou avenge thy
wrong, and the wrong of that far-off mother of thine upon
me, oh KaUikrates ? See,' and she slid to her knees, and
drew the white corsage still farther down her ivory
bosom — ' see, here beats my heart, and there by thy side
is a knife, heavy, and long, and sharp, the very knife to
slay an erring woman with. Take it now, and be avenged.
Strike, and strike home ! — so shalt thou be satisfied, KaUi-
krates, and go through Ufe a happy man, because thou hast
paid back the wrong, and obeyed the mandate of the past.'

He looked at her, and then stretched out his hand and
lifted her to her feet.

' Eise, Ayesha,' he said sadly ; ' weU thou knowest that
I cannot strike thee, no, not even for the sake of her whom
thou slewest but last night. I am in thy power, and a
very slave to thee. How can I kiU thee ? — sooner should
I slay myself.'

' Almost dost thou begin to love me, KaUikrates,' she
answered, smiUng. ' And now tell me of thy country — 'tis
a great people, is it not ? with an empire Hke that of
Eome ! Surely thou wouldst return thither, and it is weU,
for I mean not that thou shouldst dweU in these caves of
K6r. Nay, when once thou art even as I am, we wiU go
hence — fear not but that I shaU find a path — and then
shall we cross to this England of thine, and live as it be-
cometh us to live. Two thousand years have I waited for
the day when I should see the last of these hateful caves
and this gloomy-visaged folk, and now it is at hand, and
my heart bounds up to meet it hke a child's towards its
holiday. For thou shalt rule this England

' But we have a queen already,' broke in Leo, hastily.

JOB HAS A PRESENTIMENT 25;

' It is naught, it is naught,' said Ayesha ; ' she can be
overthrown.'

At this we both broke out into an exclamation of dismay,
and explained that we should as soon think of overthrowing
ourselves.

' But here is a strange thing,' said Ayesha, in astonish-
ment ; ' a queen whom her people love ! Surely the world
must have changed since I dwelt in Kor.'

Again we explained that it was the character of monarchs
that had changed, and that the one under whom we lived
was venerated and beloved by aU right-thinking people in
her vast realms. Also, we told her that real power in our
country rested in the hands of the people, and that we
were in fact ruled by the votes of the lower and least
educated classes of the community.

' Ah,' she said, ' a democracy — then surely there is a
tyrant, for I have long since seen that democracies, having
no clear will of their own, in the end set up a tyrant, and
worship him.'

' Yes,' I said, ' we have our tyrants.'

' Well,' she answered resignedly, ' we can at any
rate destroy these tyrants, and KaUikrates shall rule the
land;'

I instantly informed Ayesha that in England ' blasting '
was not an amusement that could be indulged in with
impmiity, and that any such attempt would meet with the
consideration of the law and probably end upon a scaffold.

' The law,' she laughed with scorn — ' the law 1 Canst
thou not understand, oh Holly, that I am above the law,
and so shall my KaUikrates be also ? AU human law will
be to us as the north wind to a mountain. Does the wind
bend the mountain, or the momitain the wind ?

' And now leave me, I pray thee, and thou too, my own
KaUikrates, for I would get me ready against our journey,
and so must ye both, and your servant also. But bring no
great quantity of things with thee, for I trust that we shall
be but three days gone. Then shall we return hither, and
I will make a plan whereby we can bid farewell for ever to

2s5 SHE

these sepulchres of Kor. Yes, surely thou mayst kiss my
hand ! '

So we went, I, for one, meditating deeply on the awful
nature of the problem that now opened out before us. The
terrible She had evidently made up her mind to go to
England, and it made me absolutely shudder to think what
would be the result of her arrival there. What her powers
were I knew, and I could not doubt but that she would
exercise them to the fuU. It might be possible to control
her for a while, but her proud, ambitious spirit would
be certain to break loose and avenge itself for the long
centuries of its solitude. She would, if necessary, and if
the power of her beauty did not unaided prove equal to the
occasion, blast her way to any end she set before her, and
as she could not die, and for aught I knew could not even
be killed,' what was there to stop her ? In the end she
would, I had little doubt, assume absolute rule over the
British dominions, and probably over the whole earth, and,
though I was sure that she would speedily make ours the
most glorious and prosperous empire that the world has
ever seen, it would be at the cost of a terrible sacrifice of life.

The whole thing sounded like a dream or some extra-
ordinary invention of a speculative brain, and yet it was a
fact — a wonderful fact — of which the whole world would
soon be called on to take notice. What was the meaning of
it all ? After much thinking I could only conclude that this
wonderful creature, whose passion had kept her for so many
centuries chamed as it were, and comparatively harmless,
was now about to be used by Providence as a means to
change the order of the world, and possibly, by the building
up of a power that could no more be rebelled against or
questioned than the decrees of Fate, to change it materially
for the better.

' I regret to say that I was never able to ascertain if She
was invulnerable against the accidents of life. Presumably this
was so, else some misadventure would have been sure to put an end
to her in the course of so many centuries. True, she offered to let
Leo slay her, but very probably this was only an experiment to try
his temper and mental attitude towards her. Ayesha never gave way
to impulse without some valid object.— L. H. H.

257

XXIII,

THE TEMPLE OF TliUTH.

OuE preparations did not take us very long. We put a
change of clothing apiece and some spare boots into my
Gladstone bag, also we took our revolvers and an express
rifle each, together with a good supply of ammunition, a
precaution to which, under Providence, we subsequently
owed our lives over and over again. The rest of our gear,
together with our heavy rifles, we left behind us.

A few minutes before the appointed time we once more
attended in Ayesha's boudoir, and found her also ready, her
dark cloak thrown over her wiiiding-sheet like wrappings.

' Are ye prepared for the great venture ? ' she said.

' We are,' I answered, ' though for my part, Ayesha, I
have no faith in it.'

' Ah, my Holly,' she said, ' thou art of a truth like
those old Jews — of whom the memory vexes me so sorely —
unbelieving, and hard to accept that which they have not
known. But thou slialt see ; for unless my mirror yonder
lies,' and she pointed to the font of crystal water, ' the path
is yet open as it was of old time. And now let us start
upon the new life which shall end — who knowetli where ? '

'Ah,' I echoed, ' who knoweth where ? ' and we passed
down into the great central cave, and out into the light of
day. At the mouth of the cave we fomid a single litter with
six bearers, all of them mutes, waiting, and with them I
was relieved to see our old friend Billali, for whom I had
conceived a sort of affection. It appeared that, for reasons
not necessary to explain at length, Ayesha had thought it
best that, with the exception of herself, we should proceed

S

258 SHE

on foot, and this we -were nothing loth to do, after our long
confinement in these caves, which, however suitable they
might be for sarcophagi — a singularly inappropriate word,
by the way, for these particular tombs, which certainly did
not consume the bodies given to their keeping — ^were de-
pressing habitations for breathing mortals like om'selves.
Either by accident or by the orders of She, the space in front
of the cave where we had beheld that awful dance was
perfectly clear of spectators. Not a soul was to be seen,
and consequently I do not believe that our departure was
known to anybody, except perhaps the mutes who waited
on Slic, and they were, of course, in the habit of keeping
what they saw to themselves.

In a. few minutes' time we were stepping out sharply
across the great cultivated plain or lake bed, framed like a
vast emerald in its setting of frowning chff, and had another
opportunity of wondering at the extraordinary nature of
the site chosen by these old people of K&r for their capital,
and at the marvellous amount of labour, ingenuity, and
engineering skill that must have been brought into requisi-
tion by the founders of the city to drain so huge a sheet of
water, and to keep it clear of subsequent accumulations.
It is, indeed, so far as my experience goes, an unequalled
instance of what man can do in the face of nature, for in
my opinion such achievements as the Suez Canal or even
the Mont Cenis Tunnel do not approach this ancient under-
taking in magnitude and grandeur of conception.

When we had been walking for about half an hour,
enjoying ourselves exceedingly in the delightful cool which
about this time of the day always appeared to descend upon
the great plain of Kor, and which in some degree atoned for
the want of any land or sea breeze — for all wind was kept off
by the rocky mountain wall — we began to get a clear view of
what Billali had mformed us were the ruins of the great
city. And even from that distance we could see how
wonderful those ruins were, a fact which with every step we
took became more evident. The city was not very large it
compared to Babylon or Thebes, or other cities of remote

THE TEMPLE OF TRUTH 259

antiquity; porliaps its outer wall contained some twelve
square miles of ground, or a little more. Nor had tlio
walls, so far as we could judge when we reached them,
been very high, probably not more than forty feet, which
was about their present height where they had not through
the sinking of the ground, or some such cause, fallen into
ruin. The reason of this, no doubt, was that the people
of Kor, being protected from any outside attack by far
more tremendous ramparts than any that the. hand of man
could rear, only required' them for show and to guard
against civil discord. But on the other hand they were as .
broad as they were high, built entirely of dressed stone, .
hewn, no doubt, from the vast caves, and surrounded by a
great moat about sixty feet .inr. -width, some reaches of
which were ■ still filled with -water. - About ten rainutes
before the sim finally sank w;e reached this moat, and
passed down and through it, clambering across what
evidently were the piled-up fragments of a great- bridge in'
order to do so, and then with some httle difficulty up the
slope of the wall to its summit. I wish that it lay within
the power of my pen to give some idea of the grandem- of
the sight that then met our view. There, all bathed in
the red glow of the sinldng sun, were miles upon miles of
ruins — columns, temples, shrines, and the palaces of kings,
varied with patches of green bush. Of course, the roofs
of these buildings had long since fallen into decay and
vanished, but owing to the extreme massiveness of the
style of building, and to the hardness and durability of the
rock- employed, most of the party walls and great columns
still remained standing.'

Straight before us stretched away what had evidently

' In collection ■witli the extraordinary state of preservation of ,
these ruins after so vast a lapse of time — at least six thousand years
— it must be remembered that K6r was not burnt or destroyed by
an enemy or an earthquake, but deserted, owing to the action of a
terrible plague. Consequently the houses were left tuiharmed ; also
the oliniate of the plain is remarkably fine and dry, and there is
very little rain or wind ; as a result of which these relics have only
to contend against the unaided action of time, that works but slowly
upon such massive blocks of masonry. — Tj. H. H.

S2

26o SHE

been the main thoronglifare of tlie city, for it was very
wide, wider than the Thames Emhanlrment, and regular.
Being, as we afterwards discovered, paved, or rather built,
thoroughout of blocks of dressed stone, such as were
employed in the walls, it was but little overgrown even
now with grass and shrubs that could get no depth of soil
to live in. What had beeii the parks and gardens, on the
contrary, were now dense jungle. Indeed, it was easy even
from a distance to trace the course of the various roads by
the bumt-up appearance of the scanty grass that grew
upon them. On either side of this great thoroughfare were
vast blocks of ruins, each block, generally speaking, being
separated from its neighbour by a space of what had
once, I suppose, been ga,rden-ground, but was now dense
and tangled bush. They were all built of the same
coloured stone, and most of them had pillars, which was
as much as we could make out in the fading Hght as wo
passed swiftly up the main road, that I believe I am right
in saying no living foot had pressed for thousands of years.'
Presently we came to an enormous pile, which wo
rightly took to be a temple covering at least four acres of
ground, and apparently arranged in a series of courts, each
one enclosing another of smaller size, on a principle of a
Chinese nest of boxes, which were separated one from tho
other by rows of huge columns. And, whilst I think of it,
I may as well state a remarkable thing about the shape of
these columns, which resembled none that I have ever
seen or heard of, bemg fashioned with a kind of waist in
the centre, and swelling out above and bdow. At first wo

' Billali told me that the Aniahagger believe that the site of the
city is haunted, and eould not be persuaded "to enter it upon any
consideration. Indeed, I could see that he himself did not at all
like doing so, and was only consoled by the reflection that he was
nnder the direct protection of Slie. It struck Leo and myself as
•very curious that a people which has no objection to living amongst
the dead, with whom tiieir familiarity has perhaps bred contempt,
and even using their bodies for purposes of fuel, should be terrified at
approaching the habitations that these very departed had occupied
when alive. After all, however, it is only a savage inoonsistenoy.— .
L. H. H,

> • THE TEMPLE OF TRUTH 261

thoTiglit that tHis shape was meant to roughly symbolise or
suggest the female form, as was a common habit amongst
the ancient religious architects of many creeds. On the
foUowing day, however, as we went up the slopes of the
mountain, we discovered a large quantity of the most
stately looMng palms, of which the trunks grew exactly in
this shape, and I have now no doubt but that the first
designer of those columns drew his inspiration from the
graceful bends of those very palms, or rather of their an-
cestors, which then, some eight or ten thousand years ago,
as now, beautified the slopes of the mountain that had once
formed the shores of the volcanic lake,

At the facade of this huge temple, which, I should
imagine, is almost as large as that of El-Kamac, at Thebes,
some of the largest columns, which I measured, being
between eighteen to twenty feet in diameter at the base,
by about seventy feet in height, our little procession was
halted, and Ayesha descended from her Htter.

' There used to be a spot here, KalUkrates,' she said to
Leo, who had run up to help her down, ' where one might
sleep. Two thousand years ago did thou and I and that
Egyptian asp rest therein, but since then have I not set
foot here, nor any man, and perchance it has fallen,' and,
foUowed by the rest of us, she passed up a vast flight of
broken and ruined steps into the outer court, and looked
round into the gloom. Presently she seemed to recollect,
and, walking a few paces along the waUto the left, halted.

' It is here,' she said, and at the same time beckoned
to the two mutes, who were loaded with provisions and
our little belongings, to advance. One of them came for-
ward, and, producing a lamp, lit it from his brazier (for tlio
Amahagger when on a journey nearly always carried -with
them a Httle hghted brazier, from which to provide fire).
The tiader of this brazier was made of broken fragments
of mummy carefully damped, and, if the admixture of
moisture was properly managed, this unholy compound
would smoulder away for hours.' As soon as the lamp

' Alter all we are not mucli in advance of tlie Amahagger iu

262 SHE

■was lit •we entered tlie place before -wliioli Ayeslia had
halted. It turned out to be a chamber hoUowed in the
thickness of the v/all, and, from the fact of there stiU being
a massive stone table in it, I should think that it had
probably served as a living-room, perhaps for one of tho
door-keepers of the great temple.

Here we stopped, and after cleaning the place out and
making it as comfortable as circumstances and the darkness
would permit, we ate some cold meat, at least Leo, Job,
and I did, for Ayesha, as I think I have said elsev/here,
never touched anything except cakes of flour, fruit, and
■water. While ■we ■were still eating, the moon, ■which was at
her fuU, rose above the mountam-wall, and began to flood
the place ■with silver.

' Wot ye why I have brought you here to-night, my
Holly ? ' said Ayesha, leaning her head \ipon her hand and
watching the great orb as she rose, like some heavenly
queen, above the solemn pillars of the temple. ' I brought
you — nay, it is strange, but knowest thou, Kallikrates, that
thou liest at this moment upon the very spot where thy
dead body lay when I bore thee back to those caves of K6r
so many years ago ? It all returns ' to my mind now. I
can see it, and horrible is it to my sight ! ' and she shuddered.

Here Leo jimiped up and hastily changed his seat.
However the reminiscence might affect Ayesha, it clearly
had few charms for him.

'I brought you,' went on Ayesha presently, 'that ye

might look upon the most wonderful sight that ever the

eye of man beheld— the full moon shining over ruined Kor.

When ye have done your eating— I -would that I coiild

teach thee to eat. naught but fruit, Kallikrates, but that

will come after thou hast laved in the fire. Once I, too,

ate flesh Uke a brute beast. When ye have done we will

go out, and I will show you this great temple and the God

whom men once worshipped therein.'

these matters. ' Mummy,' that is pounded ancient Egyptian, is, I
believe, a pigment much used by artists, and especially by those of
them ■who direct their talents to tho reproduction ol the ■works of the
old masters. — Et>itoe.

THE TEMPLE OF TRUTH ,. 263

Of course we got up at once, and started. And here
again my pen fails me. To give a string of measurements
and details of the various courts of tlie temple would only
be wearisome, supposing tliat I had them, and yet I know
not how I am to describe what we saw, magnificent as it
was even in its ruin, ahnost beyond the power of reaUsa-
tioin. Court upon dim court, row upon row of mighty
pillars — some of them (especially at the gateways) sculp-
tured from pedestal to capital— space upon space of empty
chambers that spoke more eloquently to the imagination
than any crowded streets. And over all, the dead silence
of the dead, the sense of utter loneliness, and the brooding
spirit of the Past 1 How beautiful it was, and yet how
drear ! We did not dare to speak aloud. Ayesha herself
was awed in the presence of an antiquity compared to
which even her length of days was but a httle thing ; we
only whispered, and our whispers seemed to run from
column to column, tiU they were lost in the quiet air.
Bright fell the moonlight on pillar and court and shattered
waU., hiding all their rents and imperfections' in its silver
garment, and clothing their hoar majesty with the pecu-
liar glory of the night. It was a wonderful sight to see
the full moon looking down on the ruined fane of Kor. It
was a wonderful thing to think for how maiay thousands
of years the dead orb above and the dead city below had
gazed thus upon each other, and in the utter solitude of
space poured forth each to each the tale of their lost life
and long-departed glory. The white Hght fell, and minute
by minute the quiet shadows crept across the grass-grown
courts like the spirits of old priests haunting the habita-
tions of their worship — the white light fell, and the long
shadows grew till the beauty and grandeur of the scene
and the untamed majesty of its present Death seemed to
sink into our very souls, and speak more loudly than the
shouts of armies concerning the pomp and splendour that
the grave had swallowed, and even memory had forgotten.

' Come,' said Ayesha, after we had gazed and gazed, I
know not for how long, • and I will show you the stony

264 SHE

flower of Loveliness and Wonder's very crown, if yet it
stands to mock time with its beauty and £.11 the heart of
man with longing for that which is behind the veil,' and,
without waiting for an answer, she led us. through two
more pillared courts into the inner shrine of the old fane.

jjjnd there„in the centre of the inmost court, that might
have been some fifty yards sijuare, or a little more, we
stood face to face with what is perhaps the grandest alle-
gorical work of Art that the genius, of her children has
ever given to the world.- For in the exact centre of the
court, placed upon a thick square slab of rook, was a huge
round ball of dark stone, some forty feet in. diameter, and
standing on the ball was a colossal winged figure of a
beauty so entrancing and divine that when I first gazed
upon it, illuminated and shadowed as it was by the soft
light of the moon, my breath stood still, and for an instant
my heart ceased its beating.

The statue was hewn from marble so pure and white
that even now, after all those ages, it shone as the moon-
beams danced upon it, and its height was, I should say, a
trifle under twenty feet. It was the winged figure of a
woman of such marvellous loveliness and delicacy of form
that the size seemed rather to add to than to detract from
its so human and yet more spiritual beauty. She was
bending forward and poising herseK upon her half-spread
wings as though to pre3er\'9 her balance as she leant.
Her arms were outstretched like those of some woniaji
about to embrace one she dearly loved, while her whole
attitude gave an impression of the tenderest beseeching.
Her perfect and most gracious form was naked, save— and
here came the extraordinary thing — the face, which was
thuily veiled, so that we could only, trace the marking of
her features. A gauzy veil was thrown round and about
the head, and of its two ends one fell down across her
left breast, which was outliij^d beneath it, and one, now
broken, streamed away updn the air behind her.

' Who is she ? ' I asked, as soon as I could take my
eyes off the statue.

THE TEMPLE OF TRUTH 265

' Canst thou not guess, oil Holly ? ' answered Ayeslia.
■' Where thea is thy imagination ? It is Truth standing on
the World, and calling to its children to unveil her face.
See -what is writ upon the pedestal. Without doubt it is
taken from the . book of the Scriptures of these men of
116r,' and she led the way to the foot of the statue, where
an inscription of the usual Chinese-looking hieroglyphics
was so deeply graven as to be still quite legible, at least to
Ayesha. According to her translation it ran th'us : —

' I& there no man that will draw my veil and look upon
my face, for it is very fair ? Unto him who draws my veil
shall I be, and peace will I give him, and sweet children
of "knowledge and good works.'

And a voice cried, ' TJwugh all those who seek after
thee desire thee, behold / Virgin art thou, and Virgin shalt
thou go till Time be done. No man is there bam of woman
who may draw thy veil and live, nor shall be. By Death'
only can thy veil be drawn, oh Truth ! '

And.Truth stretched out her arms and wept, because
those who sought her might not find her, nor look upon her
face to face.

' Thouseest,' said Ayesha, when she had finished trans-
lating, ' Truth was the Goddess of the people of old K6r,
and to her they built their shrines, and her they sought ;
knowing that they should never find, still sought they.'

■ And so,' I added sadly, ' do men seek to this very hour,
but they find not ; and, as this scripture saith, nor shall
they ; for in Death only is Truth found.'

Then with one more look at this veUed- and spiritualised
loveliness — which was so perfect and so pure that one might
almost fancy that the hght of a living spirit shone through
the marble prison to lead man on to high and ethereal
thoughts — ^this poet's dream of beauty frozen into stone,
which I never shall forget while I live, though I find my-
self so helpless when I attempt to describe it, we turned
and went back through the vast moonlit courts to the spot
whence we had started. I never saw the statue again, wliich
I the more regret, because on the great ball of stone

256 SHE

representing the World whereon, the figure stooi, Unea
were drawn, that probably, had there been Hght_ enough,
we should have discovered to be a ruap of the Universe as
it was known to the .people of K6r. It is at any rate sug-
gostive of. some scientific knowledge that, these long-dead
worshippers of Truth had recognised the fact that the globo
is round.

267

XSIV.

WALKING THE PLAMK. '

Next day tlie mutes woke us before the dawn; and by
the time that we had got the sleep out of our eyes, and
gone through a perfunctory wash at a spring which still
■welled up into the remains of a marble basin in the centre
of the North quadrangle of the vast outer court, we found
She standing by the Utter ready to start, while old Billali
and the two bearer mutes were busy coUeoting the baggage.
As usual, Ayesha was veiled like the marble Truth (by the
way, I wonder if she originally got the idea of covering
up her beauty from that statue ?) I noticed, however, that
she seemed very dejjressed, and had none of that proud
and buoyant bearing wliieh would have betrayed her among
a thousand women of the same stature, even if they had
been veiled like herself. She looked up as we came — for
her head was bowed — and greeted us. Leo asked her how
she had slept.

' 111, my KaUikrates,' she answered, ' ill. This night
have strange and hideous dreams come creeping through my
brain, and I know not what they may portend. Almost do
I feel as though some evil overshadowed me ; and yet how
can evil touch me ? I wonder,' she went on with. a sudden '
outbreak of womanly tenderness, 'I wonder if, should
aught happen to me, so that I slept awhile and left thee
waking, wouldst thou think gently of me ? I wonder, my
KaUikrates, if thou wocildst tarry till I came agaiu, as for
so many centuries I have tarried for thy coming ? '

Then, without waiting for an answer, she went on :
' Come, let us be setting forth, for we have far to go, and

268 SHE

before another day is bom in yonder blue sbonld we stand
in the place of Life.'

Tn another five mimites we were onee more on our way
througli the vast ruined city, which loomed at us on either
side in the grey dawning in a way that was at once grand
and oppressive. Just as the first ray of the rising sun shot
like a golden arrow athwart this storied . desolation we
gained the further gateway of the outer wall, and having
given one more glance at the hoar and pillared majesty
through which we had passed, and (with the exception of
Job, for whom ruins had no charms) breathed a sigh o*
regret that we had not had more time to explore it, passed .
through the great moat, and on to the plain beyond.

As the sun rose so did Ayesha's spirits, till by breakfast-
tune they had regained their normal level, and she laugh-
ingly set down her previous depression to the associations
of the spot where she had slept.

'These barbarians declare that K6r is haunted,' she
said, ' and of a truth I do believe their saying, for never
did I know so ill a night save once. I remember it now.
It was on that very spot when thou didst lie dead at my
feet, Kallikrates. Never will I visit it again ; it is a place
of evil omeii.'

After a very brief halt for breakfast we pressed on with
such good will that by two . o'clock in the afternoon we
were at the foot of the vast wall of rock that formed the
lip of the volcano, and which at this point towered up
precipitously above us for fifteen hundred or two thousand
feet. Here we halted, certainly not to my astonishment,
for I did not see how it was possible that we should go any
farther.

' Now,' said Ayesha, as she descended from her litter,
' doth our labour but commence, for here do we part with
these men, and henceforward must we bear ourselves;
and then, addressing BiUali, ' do thou and these slaves
remain here, and abide our coming. By to-morrow at the
midday shall we be with thee — if not, wait.'

Billali bowed humbly, and said that her august bidding
should be obeyed if they stopped there till they grew old.

WALKING THE PLANK 269

' And this man, oil. Holly,' said She, pointing to Job ;
' bfest is it that he should tarry also, for if his heart be not
high and his courage great, perchance some evil might
overtake him. Also, the secrets of the place whither we go
are not fit for common eyes.'

I translated this to Job, who instantly and earnestly
entreated me, almost with tears in his eyes, not to leave
him behind. He said he was sure that he could see no-
thing worse than he had already seen, and that he was
terrified to death at the idea of being left alone with those
' dumb folk,' who, he thought, would probably take the
opportunity to hot-pot him.

I translated what he said to Ayesha, who shrugged her
shoulders, and answered, ' Well, let him come, it is naught
to me ; on his own head be it, and he will serve to bear the
lamp and this,' and she pointed to a narrow plank, some
sixteen feet ia length, which had been bound above the long
bearing-pole of her hammock, as I had thought to make
curtains spread out better, but, as it now appeared, for
some unknown purpose connected with our extraordinary
undertaking.

Accordingly, the plank, which, though tough, was very
light, was given to Job to carry, and also one of the lamps.
I slung the other on to my back, together with a spare jar
of oil, while Leo loaded himself with the provisions and
some water in a kid's skin. "When this was done Slie bade
BiUali and the six bearer mutes to retreat behind a grove
of flowering magnolias about a hundred yards away, and
remain there under pain of death till we had vanished.
They bowed humbly, and went, and, as he departed, old'
BillaU gave me a friendly shake of the hand, and whispered
that he had rather that it was I than he who was going
on this ' wonderful expedition with ' STie-ioJw-rnust-he-
obeyed,' and upon my word I felt inclined to agree with
him. In another minute they were gone, and then,
having briefly asked us if we were ready, Ayesha turned,"
and gazed up the towering cHff.

' Godness me, Leo,' I said, ' surely we are not going to
climb that precipice 1 '

370 SI-IE

Leo sliniggecl his shoulders, being in a condition of
half fascinated, half expectant, mystification, and as he did
so, Ayesha with a sudden move began to climb the cliff,
and of course we had to follow her. It was perfectly mar-
velldus to see the ease and grace with wliieh she sprang from
rook to rock, and swung herself along the ledges. The .
ascent was not, however, so difficult as it seemed, although
there were one or two nasty places where it did not do to
look behind you, the; fact being that the rock still sloped
here, and was not absolutely precipitous as it. was higher
tip» In Jhis way we, with no.great labour, momited to the
height of some fifty feet above our last standiug place, the
only really troublesome thing to managebeing Job's board,
and in doing so drew some fifty or sixty paces to the left
of bur starting point; for we went up like a crab, sideways.
Presently we reached fli ledge, narrow enough at first, but
which widened' as we followed it, and moreover sloped
inwards like the petal of a flower, so that as we followed it
we gradually got iuto a kind of rut or fold of rock that grew
deeper and deeper, till at last it resembled a Devonshne
lane in stone, and hid us perfectly from the gaze of any-
body on the slope below, if there had been anybody to gaze.
This lane, (which appeared to be a natural formation) con-
tinued for some fifty or sixty paces, and then suddenly ended
in a, cave, also natural, running at right angles to it. I
am sure that it was a natural cave, and not hollowed by
the hand of man, because of its irregular and contorted
shape and course, which gave it the appearance of having
been blown bodily in the moimtain by some frightful erup-
tion of gas following the line of the least resistance. All
the caves hollowed by the ancients of Kor, on the contrary,
were cut out with the most perfect regularity and symnietry.
At the mouth of this cave Ayesha halted, and bade us light
the two lamps, which I did, giving one to her and keeping
the other myself. Then, taking the leadj she advanced
down the cavern, picking her way with great care, as
indeed it was necessary to do, for the floor w^as most irregular
— strewn with boulders hke the bed of a stream, and in

WALKING THE PLANK 271

Eome-places pitted witli deep holes, in wliicli it would have
been easy to break one's leg.

This cavern yje. pm'sued for twenty, minutes or more, it
being, so far as I could form a judgment— owing to its
numerous twists and turns no easy task — about a quarter
of a mile long.

At last, however, we halted at its farther end, and
whilst I was still trying to pierce the gloom a great gust of
air came tearing down it, and extinguished both the lamips.

Ayesha called to us, and we crept up to her, for she
wa,s a little in front, and were rewarded with a view tliat
was positively appalling in its gloom and grandeur. Before
us was a mighty chasm in the black rook, jagged and torn
and splmtered through it in a far past age by some awful
convulsion of Nature, as though it had been -cleft by stroke
i\pon stroke of the lightning. This chasm, which was
bomided by a precipice on the hither, and presumably,
though we could not see it, on the farther side also, may
have measured any width across, but from its darkness I
do not think that it can have been very broad. It was im-
possible to make out much of its outline, or how far it ran,
for the simple reason that the point where we were standing
was so far from the upper surface of the cliff, at least fif-
teen hundred or two thousand feet, that only a very dim
light struggled down to us from above. The mouth of the
cavern that we had been followhig gave on to a most curious
and tremendous spur of rock, which jutted out in mid air
into the gulf before us, for a distance of some fifty yards,
coming to a sharp point at its'termination, and reseinbling
nothing that I can think of so much as the spur upon the
leg of a cock in shape. This huge spm- was attached only
to the parent precipice at its base, which was, of com-se,
enormous, just as the cock's spur is attached to its leg.
Otherwise it was utterly unsupported.

' Here must we pass,' said Ayesha. ' Be careful lest
giddiness overcome you, or the wind sweep you into the
gulf beneath, for of a truth it hath no bottom ; ' and, with-
oxxt giving us any further time to get scared, she started

272 SHE

•walkuig" aloug the spur, leaving us to follow her as best
we might. I was next to her, then came Joh, painfully
dragging his plank, while Leo brought up the rear. It
was a wonderful sight to see this intrepid woman gliding
fearlessly along that dreadful place. For my part, when I
had gone but a very few yards, what between the pressm-e
of the air and the awful sense of the consequences that a
slip would entail, I found it necessary to go down on my
hands and knees and e::awl, and so did the other two.

But Ayesha never condescended to this. On she went,
leaning her body against the gusts of wind, and never seem-
ing to lose her head or her balance.

In a few minutes we had crossed some twenty paces of
this awful bridge, which got narrower at every step, and
then all of a sudden a great gust came tearing along the
gorge. I saw Ayesha lean herself against it, but the strong
draught got under her dark cloak, and tore it from her, and
away it went down the wind flapping like a wounded bird.
It was dreadful to see it go, till it was lost in the blackness.
I clmig to the saddle of rock, and looked round, wldle the
great spur vibrated with a humming sound beneath us, like
a hving thing. The sight was a truly awesome one. There
we were poised in the gloom between earth and heaven.
Beneath us were hundreds upon hundreds of feet of emp-
tiness that gradually grew darker, till at last it was abso-
lutely black, and at what depth it ended is more than I
can guess. Above were space upon space of giddy air, arid
far, far away a line of blue sky. And down this vast gulf
upon which we were pinnacled the great draught dashed
and roared, driving clouds and misty wreaths of vapour
before it, tiU we were nearly blinded, and utterly confused.

The whole position was so tremendous and so absolutely
unearthly, that I believe it actually lulled our sense of terror,
but to this hour I often see it in my dreams, and wake
up covered with cold perspiration at its mere phantasy.

' On ! on ! ' cried the white form before us, for now
the cloak had gone She was robed in white, and looked
more Uke a spirit riding do-\vn the gale than a woman ;

WALKING THE PLANK 273

' On, or ye will fall and be dashed to pieces. Keep your
eyes fixed npon the ground, and closely hug the rock.'

We obeyed her, and crept painfully along the quivering
path, against which the wind shrieked and wailed as it
shook it, causing it to murmur like a vast tuning-fork.
On we went, I do not know for how long, only gazing
round now and again, when it was absolutely necessary,
until at last we saw that we were on the very tip of the
spur, a slab of rock, little larger than an ordinary table,
and that throbbed and jumped like any over-engined
steamer. There we lay on our stomachs, clinging to the
ground, and looked abotft us, while Ayesha stood leaning
out against the wind, down which her long hair streamed,
and,' absolutely heedless of the hideous depth that yawned
beneath, pointed before her. Then we saw why the
narrow plank, which Job and I had painfully dragged
along between us, had been provided.- Before us was an
empty space, on the other side of which was something,
as yet we could not see what, for here — either owing
to the shadow of the opposite eUff, or from some other
cause— the gloom was that of night.

' We must wait awhile/ called Ayesha ; ' soon there-
will be Ught.'

At the moment I could not imagine what she meant.
How could more light than there was ever come to this
dreadful spot ? Whilst I was still debating in my mind,
suddenly, Hke a great sword of flame, a beam from the
setting sun pierced the Stj'gian gloom, and smote upon
the point of rook whereon we lay, illumining Ayesha's
lovely form with an unearthly splendour. I only wish
that I. could describe the wild and marvellous beauty of
that sword of fire, laid across the darkness and rushing
mist- wreaths of the gulf. How it got there I do not to this
moment know, but I presume that there was some cleft or
hole in the opposing cHff, through -which it pierced when
the setting orb was in a direct Hne therewith. All I can say
is, that the effect was the most wonderful that I ever saw.
Eight through the heart of the darlmess that flaming

274 ^ SHE

Bword was gtabbed, aud where it lay there was the most
surpassingly vivid light, so vivid that even at a distance
one cotdd see the gram of the rook, while, outside of it-
yes, within a few inches of its keen edge — was naught
but clustering shadows.

And now, by this ray of Hght, for which Shs had been
waitings and timed our arrival to meet, knowing that at
this, season for thousands -of years it had always struck
thus at sunset, we saw what was before us. Within eleven
or twelve feet of the very tip of the tongue-like rock
whereon we stood there arose, presumably from the far
bottom of the gulf, a sugarloaf-shaped cone, of which the
summit was exactly opposite to us. But had there been a
summit only it would not. have helped us much, for the
nearest point of its circumference was some forty feet from
where we were. On the "lip of this summit, however,
which was circular and hollow, rested a tremendous flat
stone, something like a glacier stone— perhaps it was one,
for all I know to the contrary— and the end of this stono
approached to within twelve feet or so of us. This
huge boulder was nothing more or less than a gigan-
tic ropMng-stoiie, accurately balanced upon the edge of
the cone or miniature crater, like a half-crown on the
rim of a wine glass ; for, in the fierce light that played
upon it and us, we could see it oscillating ia the gusts
of wind.

' Quick 1 ' said Ayesha ; ' the plank — we must cross
while the light endures ; presently it will be gone.'

'Oh, Lord, sir 1 ' groaned Job, ' surely she don't mean
us to walk across that there place on that there thing,'
as in obedience to my direction he pushed the long, board
towards me. •

' That's it, Job,' I halloaed in ghastly merriment,
though the idea of walking the plank was no pleasanter to
me than to him.

I pushed the board on to Ayesha, who deftly ran it
across the gulf so that one end of it rested on the rocking-
stone, the other remaining on the extremity of the trem-^

WALKING THE PLANK 275

bling spur. Thsn placing her foot upon it to prevent it
from being blown away, she turned to me.

' Since last I -was here, oh Holly,' she called, ' the
support of the moving stone hath lessened . somewhat, so
that I am not sure if it will bear our. weight and fall or no.
Therefore will I cross the first, because no harm will come
unto me,' and, without further ado, slie trod lightly but
firmly across the £.'ail bridge, and in another second was
standing safe upon the heaving stone,

'It is safe,' she called. 'See, hold thou the plant!
I will stsind on the farther sido of the stone so that it may
not overbalance with your^ greater weights. Now come,
oh Holly, for presently the light will fail us.'

I struggled to my Imees, and if ever I felt sick in my
life I felt sick then, and I am not ashamed to say that I
hesitated and hung back.

'Surely thou art not afraid,' called this strange creature
in a lull of the gale, from where she stood, poised like a
bird on the highest point of the roeldng-stone. ' Make
then way for Kallikrates.'

This settled me ; it is better to fall down a precipice
and die than be laughed at by such a woman ; so I
clenched my teeth, and in another instant I was on that
horrible, narrow, bending plank, with bottomless space
beneath and around me. I have always hated a great
height, but never before did I realise the full horrors of
which such a position is capable. Oh, the sickening sen-
sation of that yielding board resting on the two moving .
supports. I grew dizzy, and thought that I must fall ;
my spine crept; it seemed to me that I was falling,
and my delight at finding myself sprawling upon that
stone, which rose and fell beneath me like a boat in a
sweU, cannot be expressed in words. All I know is that
briefly, but earnestly enough, I thanked Providence for
preserving me so far.

Then came Leo's turn, and, though he looked rather
queer, he came across like a rope-dancer. Ayesha stretched
out her hand, to clasp his own, and I heard her say,

t2

276 ^ SHE

' Bravely done, my love — bravely done I The old Greek
spirit lives in thee yet I '

And now only poor Job remained on the farther side
of the gulf. He crept up to the plani, and yelled oat, ' I
can't do it, sir. I shall fall into that beastly place.'

' You must,' I remember saying -with inappropriate
facetiousness — 'you must. Job, it's as easy as catching
flies.' I suppose that I said it to satisfy my conscience,
because although the expression conveys a wonderful idea
of facility, as a matter of fact I Imow no more difficult
operation in the whole world than catching flies— that
is, in warm weather, unless, indeed, it is catching mos-
quitoes.

' I can't, sir — I cant, indeed.'

' Let the man come, or let him stop and perish there.
See, the light is dying ! In a moment it will be gone I '
said Ayesha.

I looked. She was right. The sun was passing below
the level of the hole or cleft in the precipice through which
the ray reached us.

' If you stop there. Job, you will die alone,' I called ;
' the light is going.'

' Come, be a man. Job,' roared Leo ; ' it's quite
easy.'

Thus adjured, the miserable Job, with a most awful yell,
precipitated himself face downwards on the plank — he did
not dare, small blame to him, to try to walk it, and com-
menced to draw himseK across in little jerks, his poor legs
hanging down on either side into the nothingness beneath.

His violent jerks at the frail beard made the great'
stone, which was only balanced on a few inches Of rock,
oscUlate in a most sickening manner, and, to make matters
worse, when he was half-way across the flying ray of
lurid light suddenly went out, just as though a lamp had
been extinguished in a curtained room, leaving the whole
howling wilderness of air black with darkness.

' Come on, Job, for God's sake ! ' I shouted in an agony
of fear, while the stone, gathering motion with every

WALKING THE PLANK 277

Bwiflg, rocked so violently tliat it was difficult to hang on

to it. It Tras a truly awful position.
;-..;.:; '. Lord liav6 mercy on me 1 ' cried poor Job firom the
vdaEkness. 'Oh, the plank's sHppin'gl.' and I heard a

violent struggle, and thought that he was gone.
: ... But at that moment his outstretched hand, clasping
-;in. agony at the air, met. my. own, and I hauled — ah,

how I did haul, putting out all the strength that it has
. pleased iProvidence to give me in such abunES^e — and to
^ my joy in another minute Job was gasping on the rock
J beside me. . But the plank 1 I felt it slip, and heard it

■jl^.Qck against a projecting knob of rock, and it was gone.
' Great lieavens 1 ' I exclaimed. ' How are we gomg

to get back ? '
.;-;.:' I- don't know,' answered Leo, out of the gloom.
■ ;' "Sufficient to the day is the evil thereof." I am thank-
ful enough to be here.'
', . But Ayesha merely called to me to take her hand and
.. creep after her.

278 SHE

XXV.

THE SPIEII-.OF LIFE.

I DID as I was bid, and in feai and trembling felt myself
guided oyer the edge of the stone. I sprawled my legs
out, but could touch nothing.

' I ani going to fall ! ' I gasped.

* Najj let thyself go, and trust to me,' answered
Ayesha.

Now, if the position is considered, it will be easily
understood that this was a greater demand upon my con-
fidence than was justified by my knowledge of Ayesha's .
character. For all I Imew she might be in the very act of
consigning me to a horrible doom. But in life we some-
times have to lay our faith upon strange altars, and so it
was now.

' Let thyself go 1 ' she cried, and, having no choice,
I did.

I felt myself slide a pace or two down the slopuig sur-
face of the rook, and then pass into the air, and the
thought flashed through my brain that I was lost. But
no ! In another instant my feet struck against a rocky
floor, and I felt that I was standing on something sohd,
and out of reach of the wind, which I could hear singing
away overhead. As I stood there thanking Heaven for.
these small mercies, there was a slip and a scuffle, and
down came Leo alongside of me.

' Hulloa, old fellow ! ' he called out, ' are you there ?
This is getting interesting, is it not ? '

Just then, with a terrific yell. Job arrived right on the
top of us, knocking us both down. By the time that we

THE SPIRIT OF LIFE __ 279

liad struggled to our feet again Ayeslia was standing among
us, and bidding us light the lamps, which fortunately
remained uninjured, as also did the spare jar of oil.

I got out my box of Bryant and May's was matches,
and they struei as merrily, there, in that awful place, as
they could have done in a London drawing-room.

In a couple of miuutes both the lamps were alight ; and
a curious scene they revealed. We were huddled together
in a rocky chamber, some ten feet square, and scared enough
we looked; that is, except Ayesha, who was standing'
calmly with her arms folded, and waiting for the lamps to
burn up. The chamber appeared to be partly natural, and
partly hollowed out of the top of the cone. The roof of the
natural part was formed of the swing^g stone, and that of
the back part of the chajnber, which sloped downwards,
was hewn from the hve rock. For the rest, the place was
warm and dry — a perfect haven of rest compared to the
giddy pinnacle above, and the quivering spur that shot out
to meet it in mid-air.

' So ! ' said She, ' safely have we come, though once I
feared that the rocking stone would faU with you, and
precipitate you into the bottomless deeps beneath, for I do
beheve that the cleft goeth down to the very womb of the
world. The rock whereon the stone resteth hath crumbled
beneath the s'winging weight. And now that he,' nodding
towards Job, who was-sitting on thefloor, feebly wiping his'
forehead with a red cotton pocket-handkerchief, ' whom they
rightly call the "Pig," for as a pig is he stupid, hath let fall
the plaiik, it will not be easy to return across the gulf, and
to that end must I make a plan. But now rest a while,
and look upon this place. What think ye that it is ? '■

' We Imow not,' I answered.

' Wouldst thou believe, oh Holly, that once a man did
choose this airy nest for a daily habitation, and did here
endure for many years ; leavuig it only but one day ha every
twelve to seek food and water and oil that the people brought,
more than he could- carry, and laid as an offering in the
mouth of the tunnel through which we passed hither ? '

z8o SHE

\ We looked up wonderingly, and she continued —

'Yet so it was. There was a man — Noot, he named
himself— who, though he lived in the latter days, had of
the wisdom of the sons of K6r. A hermit was he, and a
philosopher, and sMlled in the secrets of Nature, and he it
was who discovered the Fire that I shaU show you, which
is Nature's hlood and life, SiUd also that he who hathed
therein, and hreathed thereof, should live while Nature
lives. But like unto thee, oh Holly, this man, Noot, would
not turn his knowledge to account. " HI," he said, " was it
for man to Hve, for man was bom to die." Therefore did
he tell his secret to none, and therefore did he come and
live here, where the seeker after Life must pass, and was
revered of the Amahagger of the day as holy, and a hermit.
And when first I came to this country — knowest thou how
I came, Kallikrates ? Another time will I teU thee, it is a
strange tale — I heard of this philosopher, and waited for.
him when he came to fetch his food, and returned with
him hither, though greatly did I fear to tread the gulf.
Then did I begmle him with my beauty and my wit, and
flatter him with my tongue, so that he led me down and
showed me the Fire, and told me the secrets of the Fire,
but he would not suffer me to step therein, and, fearing
lest he should slay me, I. refrained, knowing that the man
was very old, and soon would die, And I returned, having
learned from him all that he knew of the wonderful Spirit of
the World, and that was much, for the man was wise and
very ancient, and by purity and abstinence, and the con-
templations of his innocent mind, had worn thin the veil
between that which we see and the great invisible truths,
the whisper of whose wings at times we hear as they sweep
through the gross air of the world. Then — it was but a
very few days after, I met thee, my Kallikrates, who hadst
wandered hither with the beautiful Egyptian Amenartas,
and I learned to love for the first and last time, once and for
ever, so that it entered into my mind to come hither with
thee, and receive the gift of Life for thee and me. There-
fore came we, with that Egyptian who would not be left

THE. SPIRIT OF LIFE 281

behind, and, behold, -we found tlie old man Noot lying but
newly dead. Thera lie lay, and his white beard covered him
Hke a garment,' and she pointed to a spot near where I
was sitting ; ' but surely he hath long since crumbled iato
dust, and the wind hath borne his ashes hence.'

Here I put out my hand and felt in the dust, and
presently my fingers touched something. It was a human
tooth, very yellow, but sound. I held it up and showed
it to Ayesha,. who laughed.

• 'Yes,' she said, 'it is his without a doubt. Behold
what remaineth of Noot and the wisdom of Noot^one
little tooth 1 And yet that man had all hfe at his command,
and for his conscience' sake would have none of it. Well,
he lay there newly dead, and we descended whither I shall
lead you, and then, gathering up all my courage,- and
corn-ting death that I might perchance win so glorious a
crown of life, I stepped into the flames, and behold ! Hfe
such as ye can never know until ye feel it also, flowed into
me, and I came forth undying, and lovely beyond imagining.
Then did I stretch out mine arms to thee, KaUikrates, and
bid thee take thine immortal bride, and behold, as I spoke,
thon, blinded by my beauty, didst turn from me, and throw-
thine arms about the" neck of Amenartas. And then a
great fury filled me, and made me mad, and I seized the
javelin that thou didst bear, and stabbed thee, so that there,
at my very feet, in the place of Life, thou didst groan and
go dovm into death. I knew not then that I had strength
to slay with mine eyes and by the power of my will, there-
fore in my madness slew I with the javelin.^

' It will be observed that Ayeslia's account of tbe death of KaUi-
krates differs materially from that -written on the potsherd by
Amenartas. The -writing on the sherd says, ' Then in her rage did
she smite him hy 'her magic, and he died.' We never ascertained
-which was the correct version, but it -will be remembered that the
body of KaUikrates had a spear-wound in the breast, which seems
conclusive, unless, indeed, it was inflicted after death. Anetber
thing that we never ascertained was how the two women — She and
the Egyptian Amenartas — managed to bear the corpse of the man
they bo-Ui loved across the dread gulf and along the shaking spur.
What a spectacle the two distracted creatures must have presented

282 SHE

' And when thou wast dead, ah I I wept, because I was
undying and thou wast dead. . I wept there in the place of
Life so that had I been mortal any more my heart had
surely broken. And she, the swart Egyptian — she cursed
me by her gods. By Osiris did she curse me Eind by Isis,
by -Nephthys and by Hekt, by Bekhet, the lion-headedi
and by Set, calling down evil on me, evil and everlastmg
desolation. Ah! I can see her dark face now lowering o'er
me Hke a storm, but she could not hurt me, and I — I know
not if I could hurt her. I did not try ; it was naught
to nie then ; so together we bore thee hence. And after-
wards I sent her — the Egyptian — away through the swamps,
and it seems that she lived to bear a son and to write tlio
tale that should lead thee, her husband, back to me, her
rival and thy murdress.

' Such is the tale, my love, and now is the hour at hand
that shall set a crown upon it. Like all things on the
earth, it is compounded of evil and of good— more of erU,
than of good, perchance ; and vrrit in letters of blood. It
is the truth ; naught have I liidden from thee, KaUikrates.
And now one thing before the final moment of thy trial.
We go down into the presence of Death, for Life and
Death are very near together, and — who loioweth ? — that
might happen which should separate us for another space
of waiting. I am but a woman, and no prophetess, and I
cannot read the future. But this I know — for I learnt it
from the lips of the wise man Noot — that my life is but
prolonged and made more bright. It cannot live for aye.
Therefore, before we go, tell me, oh KaUikrates, that of a
truth thou dost forgive me, and dost love me from thy
heart. See, KaUikrates : much evil have I done — perchaiicq
it was evil but two nights gone to strike that girl who
loved thee cold in death — but she disobeyed me and
angered me, prophesying misfortune to me, and I smote.
Be careful when power comes to thee also, lest thou too

in their grief and loveliness as they toiled along that awful place
with the dead man between them 1 Probably however the passage
was easier then, — L. H. H.

THE SPIRIT OF LIFE 283

shouldst smite in tliine anger or tliy jealousy, for nncon-
querable strength is a sore weapon in the hands of erring
man. Yea, I have sinned — out of the bitterness born of a
great love have I sinned — but yet do I know the good from
the evil, nor is my heart altogether hardened. Thy love,
oh KaUikrates, shall be the gate of my redemption, even as
aforetime my passion was the path down which I ran to
evil. For deep love unsatisfied is the hell of noble hearts
and a portion for the accursed, but love that is mirrored
back more perfect from the soul of our desired doth fashion
wings to Uft us above om-selves, and make us what we
might be. Therefore, KaUikrates, take me by the hand,
and lift my veil with no more fear than though I were
some peasant girl, and not the wisest and most beauteous
woman in this wide world, and look me in the eyes, and tell
me that thou dost forgive mo with all thine heart, and that
with all thine heart thou dost worship me.'

She paused, and the strange tenderness ia her voice
seemed to hover romid us hke a memory. I know that the
sound of it moved me more even than her words, it was so
very human — so very womanly. Leo, too, was strangely
touched. Hitherto he had been fascmated against his better
judgment, something as a bird is fascinated by a snake,
but now I think that all this passed away, and he realised
that he really loved this strange and glorious creature, as,
alas ! I loved her also. At any rate, I saw his eyes fill
with tears, and he stepped swiftly to her and undid the
gauzy veil, and then took her by the hand, and, gazing into
her deep eyes, said aloud-7-

' Ayesha, I love thee with all my heart, and so far as
forgiveness is possible I forgive thee the death of Ustane.
For the rest, it is between thee and thy Maker ; I know
naught of it. I only know that I love thee as I never
loved before, and that I will cleave to thee to the end.'

' Now,' answered Ayesha, with proud humility — ' now
when my lord doth speak thus royally and give with so free
a hand, it cannot become me to lag behind in words, and
be beggared of my generosity. Behold ! ' and she took his

s84 SHE

hand and placed it upon ier shapely head, and then bent
herself slowly down till one knee for an instant touched
the ground — ' Behold 1 in token of submission do I bow
me to my lord ! Behold I ' and she kissed him on the Hps,
' in token of my wifely love do I kiss my lord. Behold ! '
and she laid her hand upon his heart, ' by the sin I sinned,
by my lonely centuries of waiting wherewith it was wiped
out, by the great love wherewith I love, and by the Spirit
— ^the Eternal Thing that doth beget all life, from whom it
ebbs, to whom it doth return again — I swear : —

'I swear, even in this first most holy hour of com-
pleted Womanhood, that I will abandon Evil and cherish
Good. I swear that I will be ever guided by thy voice in
the straightest path of Duty. I swear that I will eschew
Ambition, and through all my length of endless days set
Wisdom over me as a guiding star to lead me unto Truth
and a knowledge of the Eight. I swear also that I will
honour and will cherish thee, Kallikrates, who hast been
swept by the wave of time back into my arms, ay, till tlio
very end, come it soon or late. I sweaf — nay, I will swear
no more, for what are words 7 Yet shalt thou loam that.
Ayeslia hath no false tongue.

' So I have sworn, and thou, my Holly, art witness to
my oath. Here, too, are we wed, my husband, with the
gloom for bridal canopy— wed till the end of all things.;
here do we write our marriage vows upon the rushing winds
which shall bear them up to heaven, and round and con-
tinually round this rolling world.

' And for a bridal gift I crown thee with my beauty's
starry crown, and enduring life, and wisdom without
measure, and wealth that none can count. Behold! the
great ones of the earth shall creep about thy feet, and their
fair women shall cover up their eyes because of the shining
glory of thy countenance, and their wise ones shall be abased
before thee. Thou shalt read the hearts of nien as an open
writing, and hither and thither shalt thou lead them as thy
pleasure listeth. Like that old Sphinx of Egypt shalt thou
sit aloft from age to age, and ever shall they cry to thee to

THE SPIRIT OF LIFE 285

solve the riddle of thy greatness that doth not pass awaj,
and ever shalt thoii mock them with thy silence 1

' Behold ! once more I Mss thee, and by that Mss I give
to thee dominion over sea and earth, over the peasant in
his hovel, over the monarch in his palace halls, and cities
crowned with towers, and those who breathe therein.
Where'er the sun shakes out his spears, and the lonesome
waters mirror up the moon, where'er storms roU, and
Heaven's painted bows, arch in the sky — ^from the pure
North clad in snows, across the middle spaces of the world,
to where the amorous South, lying Uke a bride-upon her
blue couch of sea^, breathes in sighs made sweet with
the odour of myrtles — there shall thy power pass and thy
dominion find a home. . Nor sickness, nor icy-fingered
fear, nor sorrow, and pale waste of form and mind hover-
ing ever o'er humanity, shall so much as shadow thee with,
the shadow of their wings. As a God shalt thou be, hold-
ing good and evil in the hollow of thy hand, and I, even I,
I humble myself before thee. Such is the power of Love,
and such is the bridal gift I give unto thee, EaUikrates,
beloved of Ea, my Lord and Lord of AU.

'And now it is done, and comfe storm, come shine,
come good, come evil, come life, come death, it never,
never can be undone. For,, of a truth, that which is, is,
and, being done, is done for aye, and cannot be altered. I
have said Let us hence, that all things may be accom-
plished in their order ; ' and, taking one of the lamps,, she
advanced towards the end of the chamber that was roofed
in by the swaying stone, where she halted.

We followed her, and perceived that in the wall of the
cone there was a stair, or, to be more accurate, that some,
projecting knobs of rook had been so shaped as to form a
good imitation of a stair. Down this Ayesha began to
climb, springing from step to step, like a chamois, and after
her we followed with less grace. When we had descended
some fifteen or sixteen steps we found that they ended in
a tremendous rocky slope, running first outwards and then
inwards — Hke the slope of an inverted cone, or tunnel.

286 SHE

The slope was very steep, and often precipitous, but it
was nowliere impaSsable,. and by the light of the lamps we
wfent down it with no great difficulty, though it was gloomy
work enough travelling on thus, no one of us knew
whither, into the dead heart of a volcano. As we. went,
however, I took the precaution of noting our route as well
as I could ; and this was not difficult, owing to the extra-
ordinary and most fantastic- shape of the rocks that were
strewn about, many of which in that dim light looked
more like the grim faces earven upon medieeval gargoyles
than ordinary boulders.

For a long period we travelled on thus, half an hour I
shduld say, till, after we had descended for many hundreds
of feet, I perceived that we were reaching the point of the
inverted cone. In another minute we were there, and
found that at the very apex of the funnel was a passage,
BO low and narrow that we had to stoop as we crept along
it in indian file. After some fifty yards of this creeping,
the passage suddenly widened into a cave, so huge that we
could^see. neither the roof nor the sides. We only knew
that it was a cave by the echo of our tread and the perfect
quiet of the heavy air. On we went for many minutes
in absolute awed silence, like lost souls in the depths of
Hades, Ayesha's white and ghost-like form fiittmg in
front of us, till once more the cavern ended in a passage
which opened into a second cavern much smaller than the
first. Indeed, we could clearly make out the arch and
stony banks of this second cave, and, from their rent and
jagged appearance, discovered that, like the first long
passage do^vn which we had passed through the cliff before
we reached the quivering spur, it had to all appearance
been torn in the bowels of the rock by the terrific force of
some explosive gas. At length this cave ended in a third
passage, through which gleamed a faint glow of Ught.

I heard Ayesha give a sigh of relief as this light dawned
upon us.

' It is well,' she said ; ' prepare to enter the very womb
of the Earth, wherein she doth conceive the Life that ye

THE SPIRIT OF LIFE 287

Bee brouglit forth in man and beast^ay, and in every tree
and flower.'

Swiftly she sped along, and after her we stumbled as
best we might, our hearts filled like a cup with mingled
dread and curiosity. What were we about to see ? We
passed down the tunnel ; stronger and. stronger the light
beamed, reaching us in great flashes like the rays from a
lighthouse, as one by one they are • thrown wide upon the
darkness of the waters. Nor was this all, for with the
flashes came a soul-shaking sound hke that of thunder
and of crashing trees. Now we were through it, and —
oh, heavens !

We stood in a third cavern, some fifty feet in length
by perhaps as great a height, and thu-ty wide. It was
carpeted with fine white sand, and its walls had been worn
smooth by the SiOtion of I know not what. The cavern
was not dark like the others, it was filled with a soft glow
of rose-coloured light, more beautiful to look on than any-
-thing . that can be conceived. But at first we -saw no
flashes, and heard no more of the thmiderous sound.
Presently, however, as we stood in amaze, gazuig at the
woriderfal sight, and ■wondering whence the rosy radiance
flowed, a dread and beautiful thing happened. Across the
far end of the cavern, "with a grinding and crashing noise —
a noise so dreadful and awe-mspiring that we all trembled,
and Job actually sank to his knees — there flamed out
an awful cloud or pillar of fire, Hke a rainbow many-
coloured, and like the lightning bright. For a space,
perhaps forty seconds, it flamed and roared thus, turning
slowly round and round, and then by degrees the terrible
noise ceased, and with the fire it passed away — I know not
where — leaving behind it the same rosy glow that we
had first seen.

'Draw near, draw near ! ' cried Ayesha, with a voice
of thrilling exultation. ' Behold the very Fountain and
Heart of Life as it beats m the bosom of the great world.
Behold the substance from which all things draw their
energy, the bright Spirit of the Globe, without which it

283 SHE

cannot live, but must grow cold and dead as tlie dead
moon. Draw near, and wash you in t£e living flames, and
take their virtue into your .poor frames in all its virgin
strength — not as it now feebly glows within your bosoms,
filtered thereto thtough all the fine strainers of a thousand
intermediate lives, but as it is here in the very fount and
seat of earthly Being.'

. We followed her through the rosy glow up to the head
of the cave, till at last we stood before the spot where the
great pulse beat and the great flame passed. And as we
went we became sensible of a wUd and splendid exhilara-
tion, of a glorious sense of such a fierce intensity of Life
that the most buoyant moinents of our strength seemed flat
and taine and feeble beside it. It was the mere effluvium
of the flame, the subtle ether that it cast off as it passed,
working on us, and making us feel strong as giants and
swift as eagles.

We reached the head of the cave, and gazed at each
other in the glorious glow, and laughed aloud— oven Job
laughed, and he had not laughed for a week — in the Ught-
nesB of our hearts and the divine intoxication of our brains.
I know that I felt as though all the varied genius of which
the human intellect is capable had descended upon me. I
could have spoken in blank verse of Shakespearean beauty,
all sorts of great ideas flashed through my mind ; it was as
though the bonds of my flesh had been loosened, and
left the spirit free to soar to the empyrean of its native
power. The sensations that poured in upon me are in-
describable. I seemed to hve more keenly, to reach to a
higher joy, and sip the goblet of a subtler thought than ever
it had been my lot to do before. I was another and most
glorified self, and all the avenues of the Possible were for
a space laid open to the footsteps of the Eeal.

Then, suddenly, whilst I rejoiced in this splendid
vigour of a new-found self, from far, far away there came
a dreadful muttering noise, that grew and grew to a crash
and a roar, which combined in itself all that is terrible and
yet splendid in the possibiLitieB of sound. Nearer it came.

THE SPIRIT OF LIFE 28,9

and nearer yet, till it was close upon us, rolling down like
all the thunder- wheels of heaven behind the horses of the
lightning. On it came, and with it came the glorious
blinding cloud of many-coloured light, and stood before us
for a space, turning, as it seemed to us, slowly round and
round, and then, accompanied by its attendant pomp of
sound, passed away I know not whither.

So astonishing was the wondrous sight that one and
all of us, save She, who stood up and stretched her hands
towards the fire, sank down before it, and hid our faces
in the sand.

When it was gone, Ayesha spoke.

' Now, Eallikrates,' she said, ' the mighty moment is
at hand. When the great flame comes, again thou must
stand in it. First throw aside thy garments, for it will
bum them, though thee it will not hm't. Thou must stand
in the flame while thy senses will endure, and when it
embraces -thee suck the fire down into thy very heart, and
let it leap and play around thy every part, so that thou lose
no moiety of its virtue. Hearest thou me, Eallikrates ? '

' I hear thee,. Ayesha,' answered Leo, ' -but, of a truth
— I am no coward — but I doubt me of that raging flame.
How know I that it will not utterly destroy me, so that
I lose myself and lose thee also ? Nevertheless will I do it,'
he added.

Ayesha thought for a minute, and then said —
. ' It is not wonderful that thou shouldst doubt. Tell me,
Eallikrates : if thou seest me stand in the flame and come
forth unharmed, wilt thou enter also ? '

' Yes,' he answered, ' I. will entei even if it slay me. I
have said that I will enter now.'

' And that will I also,! I cried.

' What, my HoUy 1 ' she laughed aloud ; ' rdethought
that thou wouldst naught of length of days. Why, how is
this ? '

' Nay, I know not,' I answered, 'but there is that in
my heart that calleth tome to taste of the flame, and live.'

' It is well,' she said. ' Thou art not altogether lost

u

290. - SHE

in folly.. ' See now, I will for tlie second time bathe me' io,
tliis living bath.. .Fain would I add to my beauty and my
length of days if that be possible. . If it be not possible, at
the least' it cannot harm me.

.',....' Also,' she contimied, after a momentary, pause, 'is
there another and a deeper cause why I would once agaiia
dip me in the flajne. When first I tasted of its virtue full
was niy heart of passion and of hatred of that Egyptian
Anienartas, and therefore, despite my strivings to be rid
thereof, have passion and hatred been stamped upon my
soul from that sad hour to this. But now it is otherwise.
Now is my mood a happy mood, and filled am 1 with the
purest part of thought, and so would I ever be. Therefore,
Kallikrates, wiU I once more wash and make me pure and
clean, and yet more fit for thee. Therefore also, when thou
dost in. turn stand in the fire, erbpty all thy heart of evil, and
let sweet contentment hold the balance of thy mind. Shake
loose thy spirit's wings, and take thy stand upon the utter .
verge of holy contemplation ; ay, dream upon thy mother's
kiss, and turn thee towards the vision of the highest good
that hath ever Bwept on silver wings across the silence of
thy dreams. For from the germ of what thou art in that
dread moiaent shall grow the fruit of what thou shalt be
for all unreckoned tiriie. .

' Now prepare thee, prepare ! even as though thy last
hour were at hand, and thou wast about to cross to the land
of shadows, and not through the gates of glory into the
realms of Life made beautiful. Prepare, I say I '

2gi '

XXVI.

WHAT WE BAW,

Then came a fow moments' pause, during wliich Ayeslia
seemed to be gathering up her strength for the fiery trial,
while we clung to each other, and waited in utter silence.

At last, from far far away, came' the first imunnur of
Eomid, that grew and grew till it began to crash and
bellow in the distance. As she heard it, Ayesha swiftly
threw off her gauzy wrapping, loosened the golden snake
from her Idrtle, and then, shaldng her lovely hair about
her hke a garment, beneath its cover slipped the Hrtle off
and replaced the snaky belt around her and outside the
masses of faUing hair. There she stood before us as Eve
might have stood before Adam, clad in nothuig but her
abundant locks, held round her by the golden band ; and
no words of mine can tell how sweet she looked— and yet
how divine. Nearer and nearer came the thunder wheels
of fire, and as they came she pushed one ivory arm through
the dark masses of her hair and flung it round Leo's neck.

' Oh, my love, my love 1 ' she murmured, ' -wilt thou
ever know how I have loved thee ? ' and she kissed him on
the forehead, and then went and stood in the pathway of
the flame of Life.

There was, I remember, to ray mind something very
touching about her words and that embrace upon the fore-
head. It was hke a mother's kiss, and seemed to convey
a benediction with it.

On came the crashing, rolling noise, and the sound
thereof was as the sound of a forest being swept flat by a
mighty wind, and then tossed u.p by it like so much grass,

u2

292 , SHE

and thundered down a mountain-side. Nearer and nearer
it eaine ; now flaslies of light, forerunners of the revolving
pillar of flame, were passing lite arrows through the rosy
air ; and now the edge of the pillar itself appeared. Ayesha
turned towards it, and stretched oxit her arms to greet it.
On it came very slowly, and lapped her round with flame.
I saw the fire run up her form. . I saw her lift it, with
hoth hands as though it were water, and pour it over
her head. I even sa,w her open her mouth and draw it
down into her lungs, and a dread and wonderful sight it
was.

Then she paused, and stretched out her arms, and stood
there quite still, with a heavenly smile upon her face, as
though she were the very Spirit of the Flame.

The mysterious fire played up and down her dark and
rolling looks, twining and twisting itself through and
aroimd them like threads of golden lace ; it gleamed upon
her ivory breast and shoulder, from which the hair had
slipped aside ; it slid along her pillared throat and deHcate
features, and seemed to find a home in the. glorious eyes
that shone and shone, more brightly even than the spiritual
essence.

Oh, how beautiful she looked there in the flajme I No
angel out of heaven could have worn a greater lovehness.
Even now my heart faints before the recollection of it, as
she stood and smiled at our awed faces, and I would give
half my remaining time upon this earth to see her once.
Hke that again.

But suddenly— more suddenly than I can describe — a
land of change came over her face, a change which I could
not define or explain on paper, but none the less a change.
The smile vanished, and in its place there came a. dry,
hard look ; the rounded face seemed to grow pinched, as
though some great anxiety were leaving its impress upon
it. The glorious eyes, too, lost their light, and, as I
thought, the form its perfect shape and erectness.

I rubbed my eyes, thinking that I was the victim of
some hallucination, or that the refraction from the intense

TVffAT WE SAW 293

light produced an optical deltision ; and, as I did so, the
flaming pillar slowly twisted and thundered off whitherso-
ever it passes to in the bowels of this g^reat earth, leaving
Ayesha standing where it had been,

- As soon a^' it was gone, she stepped forward to Leo's
^de — it seemed to me that there was no spring in her step
•^and stretched out her hand to lay it on his' shoulder. I
gazed at' her arm. Where was its wonderful roundness
and beauty ? It was getting thin and angular. And her
face — by Heaven \—her face was growing old before my
eyes 1 I suppose that Leo saw it also ; certainly he re-
coiled a step or two.

"■■■' ' What is it, my Kallikrates ? ' she said, and her voice
; — what was the matter with those deep and thrilling notes ?
They were quite high and cracked^

'Why, what is it— what is it?.' she said confusedly.
' I feel dazed. Surely' the quality of the fire hath not
altered. Can the principle of Life alter ? Tell me, Kalli-
iraltes, is there aught wrong with my eyeS ? I see not
clear,' and she put her hand to her head and touched her
hair — and oh, horror of horrors ! — it aU fell upon the
floor.

' Oh, looTt 1 — looh I — looh ! ' shrieked Job, in a shrill
falsetto of terror, his eyes nearly dropping out of his head,
and foam upon his Hps. ' LooTc ! — look ! — look I she's
shriveUing up ! she's turning into a monkey 1 ' and down
he fell upon the ground, foaming and gnashing in a fit.

True enough — I faint even as I write it in the living
presence of that terrible recollection — she was shriveUing
up ; the golden snake that had encircled her gracious form
slipped over her hips and to the ground ; smaller and
smaller she grew ; her skin changed colour, and in place
of the perfect whiteness of its lustre it- turned dirty
brown and yellow, like an old piece of withered parch-
ment. She felt at her head: the delicate hand was
nothing but a claw now, a human talon Mke that of a
badly-preserved Egyptian mummy, and then she seemed
to realise what kind of change was passing over her, and

294 -. SIIE_

sLe slirieked-=^ali, slie ahrielved ! — she rolled upon the floor
and Ehiieked 1

Smaller sKe grew, and smaller yet, till slie was no
larger than a bahoon. Now the skin was puckered into,
a million wrinkles, and on the shapeless face was the
stamp of Tmutterable age. I never saw anything like it;
nobody ever saw anything like the . frightful age that was
graven ou that fearful countenance, no bigger now than
that of a two-months' child, though the skull remained the
same size, or nearly so, and let all men pray to God tliey
never may, if they wish to keep their reason.

At last she lay still, or only feebly moving. She, who
but two minutes before had gazed upon us the lovehest,
noblest, most splendid woman the world has ever seen,
she lay still before us, near the masses of her own dark
hair, no larger than a big monkey, and hideous — ah, too
hideous for words. And yet, think of this — at that very
moment! thought of it — it was the same woman !

She was, dying: we saw it, and thanked God — for
while she liyed she could feel, and what must she have
felt? She raised herself iipon her bony hands, and
blmdly gazed around her, swaying her head slowly from
side tp side as a tortoise does. She could not see, for her
whitish eyes were covered with a horny film. Oh, the
horrible pathos of the sight !, But she could still speak.

' KaUikrates,' she said m husky, trembling notes.
' Forget me not, Kallilaates. Have pity on my shame ; I
shall come again, and shall once more be beautiful, I swear
it— it is true 1 Oh — h — h — ' and she fell upon her face,
and was still. ""

On the very spot where more than twenty centuries
before she had slain Kallikrates the priest, she herself fell
down and died.

Overcome with the extremity of horror, we too fell on
the sandy floor of that dread place, and swooned away.

I know not how long we remained thus. Many hours,
I suppose. 'Whon at last I opened my eyes, the other two

IVHAT WE SAW 295

were still ouistretclied upon tlie floor. TLe rosy light yet
beamed like a celestial daivn, and the thunder-'wheels of
the Spirit of Life yet rolled upon their accustomed track,
for as I awoke the great pillar was passing away. There,
too, lay the hideous little monkey frame, covered with
crinkled yellow parchment, that onoe had been the glorious
She. Alas 1 it was no hideous dream — it was an awful
and unparalleled fact !

What had happened to bring this shocking change
about? Had the nature of the life-giving Fire changed?.
Did it, perhaps, &om time to time send forth an essence of
Death instead of an essence of Life ? Or was it that the
frame once charged with its marvellous virtue could bear
no more, so that were the process repeated— it mattered
not at what lapse of time — the two impregnations neutral-
ised each other, and left the body on which they acted as
it was before it ever came into contact with the very
essence of life ? This, and this alone, would account for
the sudden and terrible ageing of Ayesha, as the whole
length of her two thousand years took effect upon her. I
have not the slightest doubt myself but that the frame
now lying before me was just what the frame of a woman
would be if by any extraordinary means life could be
preserved in her tiU she at length died at the ago of
two -and- twenty centuries.

But who can tell what had happened ? There was the
fact. Often since that awful hour I have reflected that it
requires no great stretch of imagination to see the finger
of Providence in the matter. Ayesha locked up in her
living tomb waitmg from age to age for the coming of her
lover worked but a small change in the order of the World.
But Ayesha strong and happy in her love, clothed in ini-
mortal youth and godlike beaiity, and the wisdom of the
centuries, would have revolutionised society, and even
perchance have changed the destiny of Mankind* Thus
she opposed herself against the eternal Law, and, strong
though she was, by it was swept back to nothingness
— swept back with shame and hideous mockery !

296 SHE

For some minutes I lay faintly turning these terrors
over in my mind, ■while my physioal strength came back to
me, which it quickly did in that buoyant atmosphere. Then
I bethought me of the others, and staggered to my feet,, to
see if I could arouse them. But first I took up Ayesha's
kirtle and the gauzy scarf with which she had been wont
to hide her dazzling loveliness from the eyes of men, and,
averting my head so that I might not look upon it, covered
up that dreadful relic of the glorious dead, that shocking
epitome of human beauty and human life. I did this
hurriedly, fearing lest Leo should recover, and see it again.

Then, stepping over the perfumed masses of dark hair
that lay upon the sand, I stooped down by Job, who was
lying upon his face, and turned him over. As I did so his
arm fell back in a way that I did not like, and which sent
a chill through me, and I glanced' sharply at him. One
look was enough. Our old and faithful servant was dead.
His nerves, already shattered by all he had seen and
undergone, had utterly broken down beneath this last dire
sight, and he had died of terror, or in a fit brought on by
terror. : One had only to look at his face to see it.

It was another blow ; but perhaps it may help people
to understand how overwhelmingly awful was the ex-
perience through which we. had passed — we did not feel it
much at the time. It seemed quite natural that the poor
old fellow should be dead. When Leo came to himself,
which he did vrith a groan and trembling of the limbs
about ten minutes afterwards, and I told him that Job was
dead, he merely said, ' Oh J ' And, mind you, this was
from no heartlessness, for he and Job were much attached
to each other; and he often talks of him now with the
deepest regret and affection. It was only that his nerves
would bear no more. A harp can give out but a certain
quantity of sound, however heaNdly it is smitten.

Well, I set myself to recovenng Leo, who, to my
infinite relief, I found was not dead, but only fainting, and
in the end I succeeded, as I have said, and he sat up ; and
then I saw another dreadful thing. When we entered that

WHAT WE SAW 297

awful place , his curling hair had been of the ruddiest
gold, now it was turning grey, and by the time we garaed
the outer air it was snow white. Besides, he looked
twenty years older*

' What is to be done, old fellow ? ' he said in a hollow,
dead sort of voice, when his mind had cleared a little,
and a recollection of what had happened forced itself
Tipon it.

'Trj and get out, I suppose,' I answered; 'that is,
■unless you would like to go in there,' and I pointed to the
column of fire that was once more rolhng by.

' I would go in if I were sure that it would Hll me,' he
said with a little laugh. ' It was my cursed hesitation that
did this. If I had not been doubtful she might never have
tried to show me the road. But I am not sure. The fire
might have the opposite efieot upon me. It might make
me immortal ; and, old fellow, I have not the patience to
wait a couple of thousand years for her to come back again
as she did for me. I had rather die when my hour comes —
and I should fancy that it isn't far off either — and go my
ways to look for her. Do you go in ifyon like.'

But I merely shook my head, my excitement was as
dead as ditch-water, and my distaste for the prolongation
of my mortal span had come back upon me more strongly
than ever. Besides, we neither of us knew what the effects
of the fire might be. The result upon She had not been of
an encouraging nature, and of the exact causes that pro-
duced that result we were, of course, ignorant.

' Well, my boy,' I said, ' we cannot stop here till we go
the way of those two,' and I pointed to the little heap under
the white garment and to the stiffening corpse of poor Job.
' If we are going we had better go. But, by the way, I
expect that the lamps have burnt out,' and I took one up
and looked at it, and sure enough it had.

' There is some more oil in the vase,' said Leo indiffer-
ently — ' if it is not broken, at least.'

I examined the vessel in question — ^it was intact. With
a trembling hand I fiUed the lamps — luckily there was still

298 SHE -

some of the linen wick unbumL Then I lit tliem witli one
of our wax matches. While I did bo we heard the pillar of
fire approaching once more as it went on its never-ending
journey, if, indeed, it was the same pillar that passed and
repassed in a circle. ""■

' ijet's see it coine once more,' said Leo ; ' we shall never
look upon its Hke again in this world.'

It seemed a bit of idle curiosity, hut somehow I shared
it, and so we waited till,' turning slowly round upon its own
axis, it had flamed and thundered by; and I remember
wondering for how many thousands of years this same,
phenomeiion had been taking place in the bowels of the
earth, and for how many more thousands it would continue'
to take place. I wondered also if any mortal eyes would
ever again mark its passage, or any mortal ears be thrilled
and fascmated by the swelling volume of its majestic sound.
I do not think that they will. I believe that we are the
last human beings who will ever see that unearthly sight.
Presently it had gone, and we too turned, to go.

But before we did so we each took. Job's cold hand in
ours and shook it. It was a rather ghastly ceremony, but
it was the only means in our power of showing our respect
to the faithful dead and of celebrating his obsequies. The
heap beneath the white garment we did not uncover. We
had no wish to look upon that terrible sight again. But
we went to the pile of rippling hair that had fallen from
her in the agony of that hideous change which was worse
than a thousand natural deaths, and each of us drew from
it a shiuing lock, and these locks we still have, the sole
memento that is left to us of Ayesha as we know her in the
fulness of her grace and glory. Leo pressed the perfumed
hair to his lips.

' She called to me not to forget her,' he said hoarsely ;
' and swore that we should meet again. By Heaven ! I
never will forget her. Here I swear that, if we live to get
out of this, I will not for all my days have anything to
say to another living woman, and that wherever I go I
will wait for her as faithfully as she waited for me.'

, what: WE SAW 29$^.

' Yes,' I thdugM to myself, ,' if. ste comes baotas beau-
tiful as we kne'w Her. But supposing she came back like
that 1 ' »

Weil, and then wewent. We went, and left those two
in the presence of the very well and spring of Life, but
gathered to the cold. company of Death. How lonely they
looked as they lay there, and how ill assorted! - That Httle
heap had been for two- thousand years the wisest, loveliest,
proudest creature— I can hardly call her woman— in the
whole universe. She had been wicked, too, in her way;
but, alas 1 such is the frailty of the human heart, her
wickedness had not detracted from her charm. Indeed,
I am by no means certain that it did not add to it. It was
after all of a grand order, there was nothing mean or small
about Ayesha.

■- And poor Job, too 1 His presentiment had come true,-
and there was an end of him. Well, he has a strange
burial-place — no Norfolk hind ever had a stranger, or ever
will ; and it is something to He in the same sepulchre with
the poor remains of the irnperial She.

We looked our last upon them and the indescribable rosy
glow in which they lay, and then with hearts far too heavy
for words we left them, and crept thence broken-down men
— so broken down that we even renounced the chance of
practically immortal life, because aU that made life valu-
able had gone from us, and we knew even then that to
prolong our days indefinitely would only be to prolong our
sufferuigs. For we felt— yes, both of us^— that having once
looked Ayesha in the eyes, we could not forget her for ever
and ever while memory and identity remained. We both
loved her now and for always, she was stamped and carven
on our hearts, and no other woman or interest could ever
raze that splendid" die, And I— there lies the. sting — I had

' "What a terrifying reflection it is, by tie -way, that nearly all
our deep love for women who are not our kindred depends — at any
rate, in the first instance— upon their personal appearance. It we
lost them, and found them again dreadful to look on, though other-
wise they were the very same, should we still love them ? — L. H. H.

300 SHE

and liave no riglit to flunk time of her. As she told me,
I was naught to her, and never shall be through the
unfathomed depth of Time, unless, indeed, conditions alter,
and a day comes at last when two men may love one woman,
and all three be happy in the fact. It is the only hope of my
broken-heartedness, and a rather faint one. Beyond it I
have nothing. I have. paid down this heavy price, all that
I am worth here iaaidhereaffier, and that is my sole reward.
With Leo it is different, and often and. often I bitterly envy
him his happy lot, for if She was right, and her wisdom
and knowledge did not fail her at the last, which, arguing
from the precedent of her own case, I think most unlikely,
he has some future to look forward to. But I have none, and
yet — ^maark the folly and the weakness of the human heart,
and let him who is wise learn wis^iom from it^yet I would
not have it otherwise. I mean that I am content to give
what I have given and must always give, and take in pay-
ment those erimibs that fall from my mistress's table, the
memory of a few kind words, the hope one day in the far
imdreamed future of a sweet smUe or two of recognition,
a little gentle friendship, and a little show of thanks for my
devotion to her — and Leo.

If that does not constitute true love, I do. not know
'what does, and all I have to say is that it is a very bad
state of mind for a man on the wrong side of middle age
to fall into.

301.

xxvn.

WB LEAP.

We passed through the eaves without trouhle, but when
we came to the slope of the inverted cone two difficulties
stared us in the face. The first of these was the laborious
nature of the ascent, and the next the extreme difficulty of
finding oUr way. Indeed, had it not been for the mental
notes that I had fortunately taken of the shape of various
rocks, etc., I am sure that we never should have managed
it at all, but have wandered about in the dreadful womb of
the volcano^for I suppose it must once have been something
of the sort — until we died of exhaustion and despair. As it
was we went wrong several times, and once nearly fell into
a huge crack or crevasse. It was terrible work creeping
about in the dense gloom and awful stillness from boulder
to boulder, and examining it by the feeble light of the lamps
to see if I could recognise its shape; We rarely spoke, our
hearts were too heavy for speech, we simply stumbled
about, falling sometimes and cutting ourselves, in a rather
dogged sort of way. The fact was that our spirits were
utterly crushed, and we did not greatly care what happened
to us. Only we felt bound to try and save our hves whilst
we could, and indeed a natural instiiict prompted us to it.
So for some three or four hours, I should thiiik^ — I camipt
teU exactly how long, for we had no watch left that would
go — ^we blundered on. During the last two hours we were,
completely lost, and I began to fear that we had got into
the funnel of some subsidiary cone, when at last I sud-
denly recognised a very large rook which we had passed
in descending but a little way firom the top. It is a marvel

302 SHE

that I should have reeognised it, and, indeed, we had
already passed it going at right angles to the proper path,
■when something about it struck me, and I turned back
and examined it in an idle sort of way, and, as it hap-
pened, this proved our salvation.

After this we gained the rocky natural stair without
much farther trouble, and in due course foimd ourselves
back in the little chamber where the benighted Noot had
lived and died. ■ , -^

But now a iresh terror stared us in the face. It will
be remembered that owing to Job's fear and awkwardness,
the plank upon which we had crossed from the huge
spur to the rocking-stone had been whirled off into the
tremendous gulf below.

How were we to cross without the plank?

There was only one answer— we must try asidLJuiivp it,
or else stop there till we starved. The distance in itself
was not so very great, between eleven and twelve feet I
should think, and I have seen Leo jump over twenty when
he was a young fellow at college ; but then, think of the
conditions. Two weary, worn-out men, one of them on.
the wrong side of forty, a rocking-stone to take off from, a
trembling point of rock some few feet across to land upon,
and a bottomless gulf to be cleared iii a raging gale ! It
was laad enough, God knows, but when I pointed out these
things to Leo, he put the whole matter in a nutshell by
replying that, merciless as the choice was, we must choose
between the certainty of a lingeriiig. death in the chamber-
and the risk of a swift one in the air. Of course, thSre was no
arguing against this, but one thing was clear, we could not
attempt that leap in the dark ; the only thing to do was to
wait for the ray of light which pierced through the gulf at
sunset. How near to or'how far from sunset we might be,
neither of us had the faintest notion ; all we did know was,
that when at last the light came it would not endure more
than a couple of minutes at the outside, so that we must be
prepared to meet it. Accordingly, we made up our minds
to creep on to the top of the rocking-stone and lie there

WE LEAP 30J

in readiness. We were the more easily reconciled to this
course by the fact that our lamps -were once more nearly
ediausted — indeed, one had gone out bodily, and the other
was jumping up and do^wn as the flame of a lamp does
■when the oil is done. So, by. the aid of its dying light,
we hastened to crawl out of the little chamber and clamber
up the side of the great stone.
As we did so ^lie light went out.

The difference in our position was a sufficiently remark-
able one. Below, in the little chamber, we had only heard
the roaring of the gale overhead— here, lying on our faces
on the swinging stone, we were exposed to its ftdl force
and fury, as the great draught drew first fi:om this dnection
and then from that, howling against the. mighty precipice
and through the rocky cliffs hke ten thousand despairing
souls. We lay there hour after hour in terror and misery
of inind so deep that I will not attempt to describe it, and
listened to the wild storm-voices of that Tartarus, as, set to
the deep undertone of the spur opposite against which the
wind hummed like some awful harp, they caUed to each
other from precipice to precipice. No nightmare dreamed
by man, no wild invention of the romancer, can ever equal
the hving horror of that place, and the weird crying
of those voices of the night, as we clung Hke shipwrecked
maimers to a raft, and tossed on the black, unfathomed
wilderness of air. Fortunately the temperature was not a
low one ; indeed, the' wind was warm, or we should have
perished. So we clung and listened, and while we were
stretched out upon the rock a thing happened which was so
curious and suggestive in itself, though doubtless' a mere
coincidence, that, if anjiihing, it added to, rather than de-
ducted from, the burden on our nerves-
It will be remembered that when Ayesha was standing
on the spur, before we crossed to the stone, the wind tore
her cloak from her, and whirled it away into the darkness
of the gulf, we could not see whither. Well — I' hardly
like to tell the story ; it is so strange. As we lay there
upon the roekuig-stone, this very cloak came floating out

304 SHE

of the blaoi space, like a memory from the dead, and fell
on Leo — so that it covered him nearly from head to foot.
We could not at first make out what it was, but soon
discovered by its feel, and then poor Leo, for the first time,
gave way, and I heard him sobbing there upon the stone.
No doubt the cloak had been caught upon some pinnacle
of the cliff, and was thence blown hither by a chance gust ;
but stiU, it was a most curious and touching incident.

Shortly after this, suddenly,- without the slightest
previous warning, the great red knife of light came stabbiog
the darlmess through and through — struck the swaying
stone on which we were, and rested its sharp point upon the
spur opposite.

' Now for it,' said Leo, ' now or never.'

We rose and stretched ourselves, and looked at the
cloud- wreaths stained the colour of blood by that red ray as
they tore through the sickening depths beneath, and then
at the empty space between the swaying stone and the
.quivering rook, and, in our hearts, despaired, and prepared
for death. Surely we could not clear it — desperate though
we were.

' Who is to go first ? ' said I.

' Do you, old fellow,' answered Leo. 'I wiU sit upon
the other side of the stone to steady it. You must take as
much run as you can, and jump high ; and God have
mercy on us, say I.'

I acquiesced with a nod, and then I did a thing I had
never done since Loo was a Httle boy. I turned and put
my arm roimd him, and kissed him on the forehead. It
sounds rather French, but as a fact I wa^ taking my last
farewell of a man whom I coiiLd iiot have loved more if he
had been my own son twice bver. •

' ' Good-bye, my boy,' I said, ' I hope that we shall meet
again, wherever it is that we go to.*

The fact was I did not expect to live another tv,-o
minutes.

Next I retreated to the far side of the rook, and waited
till one of the chopping gusts of wind got behind nie, and

IV£ LEAP 305

(■
then, eommencling my soul to God, I ran the length of the
huge stone, some three or four arid thirty feet, and sprang
wildly but into the dizzy air. Oh! the sickening terrors
that I felt as 1 launched riiyself at that little point of rook,
and the horrible sense of despair that" shot through my
brain as I "realised that I had jumped short I But so it
was, my feet never touched the point, they went down into
space, only my hands and body came in ' contact with it.
I gripped at it with a yell, but one hand shpped, and I
swung right rourid, holding by the other, so that I faced
the stone froin which I had sprung. Wildly I stretched
up with my left handj and this time managed to grasp a
knob "of rock, and there I hung in the fierce red light, with
thousands of feet of empty air beneath me. My hands
were holding to either side of the under part of the spur,
so that its' point was toiiching my head. Therefore, even
if I could have found the strength, I could riot pull myself .
up. The m!ost that I could do would be to hang for about
a minute, and then' drop down, down. into the bottomless
pit, K any man can imagine a more hideous .position, let
him. speak! AE I know is that the torture of that half*
minute nearly turned my brain.

I heard Leo give a cry, and then suddenly saw him in
mid air springing up and out like a chamois. It was a
splendid leap that he took under the influence of his terror
and despair, clearing the horrible gulf as though it were
nothing, and, landing.weU on to the rocky point, he threw
himself upon liis face, to prevent his pitching off into the '
depths. I felt the spur above me shake beneath the shock
of his impact, and as it did so I saw the huge rocking-
stone, that had been violently depressed by hun as he
sprang, fly back when relieved of his weight till, for the
first time dm-ing, all these centuries, it got beyond its
balance, and fell with a most awful crash right into the
rocky chamber which had once served the philosopher Noot
for a hermitage, as I have no doubt, for ever hermetically
sealing the passage that leads to the Place of Life with
some hundreds of tons of rock,

X

3o6 SHE

All this Happened in a second, and curiously endugli,
notwithstanding my terrible position, I noted it involun-
tarily, as it ■were. I even remember thinking that no
human being would go down that dread path again.

Next instant I felt Leo seize me by the right wrist with
both hands. By. lying flat on the point of rock he could
just reach me.

. 'You must let go and swing yourself clear,' he said in a
calm arid collected voice, ' and then I will try and puU you
up,, or we will both go together. Are you ready ?'
.... By. way of ..answer I let go, first with, my left hand, and
then with the right, .and swayed.aut as a. consequence clear
of the overshadowing rock, my weight hanging upon Leo's
arms. It was a dreadful moment. .He was a very power-
ful man, I. knew, but would his . strength be equal to
lifting, me, up tiU I.could get a hold on the top of the spur,
when owing to his position .he had so little purchase ?

For a few. seconds I swung to and Jro,. while he gathered
himself for the effort, and then I heard his sinews cracking
above me, and felt ^myself lifted up as though I were a
little child, till. I got my left arm round the rock, and my
chest was resting on it. The rest was easy ; in two or
three more seconds I was up, and we were lying panting
side by side, . trembling like, leaves, and with the cold
perspiration of terror pouring from our skins.
, And then, as before, the light went out like a lamp.

For some half -hour we lay thus without speaking a
word, arid then at length began to creep along the great
spur as best we might in the dense gloom. As we drew
towards the face of the cliff, however, from, which the spur
sprang out like a spike from awall,the light increased, though
only a very little, for it was night overhead. After that
the gusts of wind decreased, and we got along rather better,
and at last reached the mouth of the first cave or tunnel.
But now a fresh trouble stared us. in the face : our oil was
gone, and the lamps were, no doubt, crushed to powder
beneath the fallen rocHng-stone. We were even without
a drop of water to stay oiu' tliirst, for we had drunk the

WE LEAP 307:

last in the eliambcr of Noot. How were we to see to make
our way through this last boulder- strewn tunnel ?

Clearly aD, that wo could do was to trust to our sense
of feeling, and attempt the passage in the dart, so in we
crept, fearing that if we delayed to do so our exhaustion
would OYercome us, and we should probably He down and.
die where we were, , '

Oh, the horrors of that last tunnel 1 The place waS'
strewn with rocks, and we fell over them, and knocked
ourselves up against them till we were bleeding from a
score of wounds. Our only guide was the side of the
cavern, which we kept touching, and so bewildered did we
grow in the darkness that we were several times seized with,
the terrifying thought that we had turned, and were
travelling the wrong way. On we went, feebly, and .still
more feebly, for hour after hour, stopping every few minutes
to rest, for our strength was spent. Once we fell asleep,-
and, I think, must have slept for some hours, for, when we
woke, our limbs were quite stiff, aJid the blood from' our
blows and scratches had caked, and was hard and dry upon
our skin. Then we dragged om-selves on again, till at last,
when despair was entering into our hearts, we once more
saw the hght of day, and found ourselves outside the tunnel
in the rocky fold on the outer surface of the chff that, it
win be remembered, led into it.

It was early morning-^that we could tell by the feel of
the sweet air and the look of the blessed sky, which we
had never hoped to sbe again. It was, so near as we knew,
an hour after sunset when we entered the tunnel, so it
followed that it had taken us the entire night to crawl
through that dreadful place.

' One more effort, Leo,' I gasped, 'and we shall reach'
the slope where BiLLali is, if he hasn't gone. Come, don't
give way,' for he had cast himself upon his face. He got-
up, and, leaning on each other, we got down that fifty feet
or so of cliff— somehow, I have not the leaist notion how.'.
I only remember that we found ourselves lying in a heap
at the bottom, and then once more began to drag ourselves

x2

3na- ■ SHE-

along on oiir hands and Imees towards tHe grove where /SAtf
had told BiEali to wait her re-iarrival, for we could not,
walk another foot. . We had not gone fifty yards in this
fashion • when siiddenly one of the mutes emerged front
some trees on our left, through which, I presume, he had
heen taking a morning stroll, and came running up to see
what sort of strange animals we were. He stared, and
stared,- and theii held up his hands in horror, and .nearly
fell to' the .ground. Next, he started off as hard as he could
for the. grove. some two hundred yards away. No wonder
that he was horrified at our appearance, for we must have
been a shocking sight. To begin, Leo, vyith his golden
curls turned a snowy white, his clothes nearly rent from
his body, his worn face and his hands a mass of bruises,
cuts, and blood-encrusted filth, was a sufficiently alarm-
ing spectacle, as he painfully dragged himself along the
ground, and I have no doubt that I was little better to
look_on. ' I know that two days afterwards when I looked
alt my. face in some water I scarcely recognised myself. " I
have^never been famous for beauty, but there was some-
thing beside ugliness stamped upon my features that I have
never got rid of until this day, something resembling that-
wild look with which a startled person wakes fcom' deep
sleep more than anything else that I can think of. And
really it is not to be wondered at. What I do wonder at
is that we escaped at aU with our rea.son.

Presently, to my intense relief, I saw old Billali hurrying
towards us, and even then I could, scarcely help smiling at
the expression of consternation on his dignified counten-
ance. . .

' Oh, my Baboon ! my Baboon 1 ' he cried, ' my dear son,
is it indeed thee and the Lion ? Why, his mane that was
ripe as com is white like the snow. Whence come ye ? and
where is the Pig, and where too SJie-who-must-be-oheyed ?'

'Dead, both dead,' I answered ; ' but ask no questions ;
help us, and give us food and water, or we too shall die
before thine eyes. Seest thou not that our tongues are
black for ',vant of water ? How can we talk then ? '

IVE LEAP - 309

' Dead 1 ' he gaSped. ' Impossible. SM wKo never dies
— dead, how can it be ? ' and then, perceiving, I think, that
his face was being watched by the mutes who had come
ruTiniTig up, he checked himself, and motioned to them to
carry us to the camp, which they did.

■ Fortunately when we arrived some broth was boiling on
the fire, and with this Billah fed us, for we were too' weak
to feed ourselves, thereby I firmly believe saving us from
death by exhaustion. Then he bade the mutes wash the
blood and grime fi:om us with wet cloths,' and after that we
were laid down upon piles of aromatic grass; and instantly
fell into the dead sleep of absolute exhaustion of miud and
.body.

SHE

xxvni.

OYEIl THE MOUNTAIN..

The next tiling I recollect is a feeling of the most
dreadful stiffness, and a sort of vagiie..idea passing through
my half-avak-ened brain that I was a carjpet thai had just
been beaten. I opened my eyes, and the first thing they
fell on was the venerable countenance of our old friend
BHlali, "who was seated by the side of the improvised bed
upon which I was sleeping, and thoughtfully stroking his
long beard. The sight of him at once brought baoli to my
mind a recollection "of all that we had recently passed
through, ■which was accentuated by the vision of poor
Leo lying opposite to me, his face knocked almost to a
jelly, and his beautiful crowd of curls turned from' yellow
to white,' and I shut my eyes again and groaned.

' Thou has slept long, my Baboon,' said old BillaH.

' How long, my father-? ' I asked.

' A round of the sun and a round of the moon, a day
and a night hast thou slept, and the Lion also. See, he
sleepeth yet.'

'Blessed is sleep,' I answered, 'for it swallows up
recollection.'

' Tell me,' he said, ' what hath befallen ye, and what
is this strange story of the death of Her who dieth not.
Bethink thee, my son : if tliis be true,, then is thy danger
and the danger of the Lion very great — nay, almost is the
pot red wherewith ye shall be potted, and the stomachs of

•Curiously enough, Leo's hair has lately been to some extent
regaining its colour — that is to say, it is now a yellowish grey, and I
am not without hopes that it will in time come quite right. — L. H. H.

OVER THE MOUNTAIN af'

•tlidse who shall eat ye are already hungry' for the feast.
Knowest thou not that these Amahagger, my children,
these d-wellers in the caves, hate ye ? They hate ^e as
strangers, they hate ye more because of their brethren
whom Sh& put to the torment for your sake. Assuredly,
if once they learn that there is naught to fear firom Hiya,
from the terrible. One-who-must-be-oheyed, they will slay ye
by the pot. But let me hear thy tale, my poor Baboon.'

Thus adjured, I set to wort and told him— not every-
thing, indeed, for I did not think it desirable to do so, but
.sufficient for my purpose, which was to ma,ke him under-
stand that SJie was really no more, having fallen into some
fire, and, as I put it — for the real thing would ha,ve been
incomprehensible to him — been burnt up. I also told him
some of the. horrors we had undergone. in effecting our
escape,. and these produced a great impression on him.
But I clearly saw that he did not beheve in the report of
Ayesha's death. He beheved indeed that we thought that
she was dead, but his. explanation was that it, had suited
her to disappear for a whilci Once, he said, in his father's
time, she had done so for twelve years, and there was a
tradition in the country that many centuries back no one
had seen her for a whole generation, when she suddenly
reappeared, and destroyed a woman who had assumed the
position of Queen. I said nothing to this, but only shook
my head sadly. Alas ! I knew too well that Ayesha would
appear no more, or at any rate that BiLLaili would never, see
her again.

« And now,' concluded BiUali,. ' what wouldst ihou do,
my Baboon?' '. .

' Nay,' I said, ' I know not, my father. Can we not
escape from this country ? ' . ,

He shook his head.

' It is very difficult. By K6r ye cannot pass, for ye
would be seen, and as soon as those fierce ones found that
ye were alone, well,' and he smiled significantly, and made
a movement as though he were placing a hat on his head.
' But there is a way over the cliff whereof I once spake to

312 , ~ SHE

thee, where they drive the cattle put to pasture. Then
beyond the pastures are three days' journey through the
marshes, and after that I know not, but I have heard
that seven days' journey from thenoe is a mighty . river,,
which floweth to the black water. If ye could come
thicher, perchance ye might escape, but how can ye come
thither?'. , .

' BiEali,' I said, 'once, thou knowest, I did save thy
life. Now pay back the debt, my father, and save me
mine and my friend's, the Lion's.; It shall be a pleasant
thing, for thee to think of when thine; hour comes, and.
something to set in the scale, against the evil doing of thy
days, if perchance thou hast done any evil. Also, if thou
be right, and if Sfee doth but hide herself, surely when she-
comes again she shall reward thee.'

' My son the Baboon,' answered the old man^, ' think
not that I have. an ungrateful heart. Well do I rraiember
how thou didst rescue me when those dogs stood by to see
me drown. Measure for measure will I give thee, and if
thou canst be saved, surely I will save thee. Listen : by
dawn to-morrow be prepared, for. litters shall be here to
bear ye away across the mountains, and through the
marshes beyond. This will I do, saying that it is the word
of Bha that it be done, and he who obeyeth not the word
of SAe food is he for the hysenas. Then when ye have
crossed the marshes, ye must strike with your own hands,
so that perchance, if good fortune go with you, ye may live,
to come to that black water whereof ye told me. And
now, see, the Lion wakes, and ye must eat the food I have
made ready for you.'

. . . Leo's condition when once he was fairly aroused pfoVed
not to be so bad as might have been expected from his
appearance, and we both of us managed to eat a hearty
meal, which indeed we needed sadly enough. After this
we limped down to the spring and bathed, and then came
back and slept again tOl evening, when we once more ate
enough for five. Billali was away all that day, no doubt
making arrangements about litters and bearers, for we were

OVER THE MOUNTAIN 313

V

a^wakened in the middle of the night by the arrival of a
considerable number of men in the little camp.

At dawn the old man himself appeared, and told ns
that he had by using She's dreaded name, though ■with
some difficulty, succeeded in getting the necessary men
and two guides to conduct us across the swiamps, and that
he urged us to start at once, at the same time announcing
his intention of accompanying us so as to protect us against
treachery. I was much touched by this act of Idndness on
the part, of that wily old barbarian towards two utterly
defenceless strangers. A three — or in his case, for he
would have to return, six — days' journey through those
deadly swamps was no light undertaking for" a man of his
age, but he consented to do it cheerfully in order to pro-
mote our safety. It shows that even among those dread-
ful Amahagger — who are certainly with their gloom and
their devilish and ferocious rites by far the most terrible
savages that I ever lieard of — there are people with kindly
hearts.' Of course self-interest may have had something
to do with it. He may have thought that SAe would
suddenly reappear and demand ah account of us at his
hands, but still, allowing for all deductions, it was a great
deal more than we could expect under the circumstances,
and I can only say that I shaU for as long a,s I live cherish
a most affectionate remembrance of my nominal parent,
old Billali.

Accordingly, after swallowing some food, we started in
the litters, feeling, so far as our bodies went, wonderfully
like our old selves after our long rest and sleep. I must
leave the condition of our minds to the imagination.

Then came a terrible pull up the cliff. Sometimes the
ascent was natiu^al, more often it was a zig-zag roadway
cut, no doubt, in the first instance by the old inhabitants
of Kor. The Amahagger say they drive their spare cattle
over it once a year to pasture outside ; all I know is that
those cattle must be uncommonly active on their feet. Of
course the litters were useless here, so we had to walk.

By midday, however, we reached the great flat top of

r3i4. --.^ SHE

. that miglity -warll of tock, and ' grand enougla tlie view was
from it, with the plain of ]I6r, in the centra' of which we
could clearly make out the piHared ruins of the Temple of
Truth to the one side, and the boundless and melancholy
marsh on the. other, This wall of rock, which had no
douht once formed the lip of the crater, was about a mile
and a half thick,, and still covered with clinker. Nothing
grew there, and the only thidg to relieve our eyes were
occasional pools of rain-water (for raiu had lately fallen)
wherever there was a little hollow. Over the flat crest of
this mighty rampart we went, and then came the descent,
which, if not so difficult a matter as the getting up, was
still sufficiently break-neck, and took us tiU sunset. That
night, however, we.caniped in safety upon the mighty
slopes that rolled away to the marsh beneath.

On the following morning, about eleven o'clock, began
our dreary journey across those awful seas of swamps which
I have already described.

For three whole days, through stench and mire, and
the all-prevailing flavour, of fever, did our bearers struggle
along, till at length we came to open rolling grpund quite
imcultivated, and mostly treeless, but covered with game
of all sorts, which lies'beyondthat most desolate, and with-
out guides utterly impracticable, district. And here on the
following momiug we bade farewell, not without some
regret, to old BiLlali, who stroked his white beard and
Bolemnly blessed us,

' Farewell, my son the Baboon,' he said, ' and farewell
to thee too, oh Lion. I can do no more to help you. But
if ever , ye come to your comitry, be advised, and venture no
more into lands that ye know not, lest ye come back no
more, but leave your white bones to mark the limit of your
joumeyings. Farewell once more; often shall I think of
you, nor wilt thou forget me, my Baboon, for though thy
face is ugly thy heart is true.' And then he turned and
went, and with him went the tall and suUen-looking
bearers, and that was the last that we saw of the Ama-
hagger. We watched them winding away with the empty

OVER THE MOUNTAIN 315

.litter^ like a procession bearing dead men from a battle,

, till the mists from tie marsh gathered roimdthem and hid

,them, and then, leffutterly desolate in- the vast wilderness,

.we turned and gazed around us and at each other.

Three weeks or so before' four men had entered the

. marshes of E6r, and now two of us were dead, and the
other two had gone through' adventures and experiences so
strange and terrible that death himself hath not' a niore
fearful countenance. . Three weeks-^and only three weeks 1
Truly time should be measured by events, and not by the

■ lapse of hours. It seeined hke thirty years since we saw

, the last of our whale-boat.

; ' Wo must strike out for the Zambesi, Leo,' I said,
' but God knows if we shall ever get there.'

Leo nodded. He had become very silent of late, and
we started with nothing but the clothes "we stood in, a
compass, our revolver's and express rifles, and about two
hundi'ed rounds of ammunition, and so ended the history
of our visit to the ancient ruins of mighty and imperial
Kor. . ,

As for the adventures that subsequently befell us,
strange and varied as they wore, I have, after dehberation,
<letormined not to record them here. Li these pages I

.have only tried to give a short and'clear account of an occur-
rence which I believe to be unprecedented, and this I have
done, not with a view to immediate publication, but merely

;to put on pa,per while they are yet fresh in our memories the
details of our journey and its result, which will, I believe,
prove interesting to the world if ever we determme to make
them public. This, as at present advised, we tlo not intend
.should be done during our joint lives.

For the rest, it is of no public interest, resembluig as ■
it does the experience of more than one Central 'African
traveller. Suffice it to say, that we did, after incredible
hardships and privations, reach the Zambesi, which proved
to be about a hundred and seventy miles south of where
Billali left us. There we were for six months imprisoned
by a savage tribe, v.'ho believed us to be supernatural

3i6 SHE

beings, oliiefly on account of Leo's youthful face and snow-
white hair. From these people we ultimately escaped, and,
crossing the Zambesi, wandered off southwards, where,
when on the point of starvation, we were sufficiently for-
tunate to fall in with a haKr caste Portuguese elephant-
hunter who had followed a troop of elephants farther in-
land than he had ever been before!. This man treated us
most hospitably, and ultimately through his assistance
we, after innumerable sufferings and adventures, reached
Delagoa Bay, more than eighteen months from the time
when we emerged from the marshes of E6r, and the very
next day managed to catch one of the steamboats that
run round 'the Cape to England. Our journey honie was
a prosperous one, and we. set our foot on the quay at
Southampton exactly two years from the date of our depar-
ture upon our wild and seemingly ridiculous quest, and I
now, write these last words with Leo leaning over my
shoulder in-my old room in my ooUege, the very same into
which some two-and-twenty years ago "my poor Mend
Vincey came stumbling on the memorable night of his
death, bearing the iron chest with him.

And that is the end of this history so far as it con-
cerns science and the outside world. What its end will be as
regards Leo and myself is more than I can guess at. But
we feel that is not reached yet. A story that began more
than two thousand years ago- may stretch a long way into
the dim and distant future.

Is Leo really a reincarnation of the ancient Kallikrates
of whom the inscription tells ? Or was Ayesha deceived by
some strange hereditajy resemblance ? The reader must
form his own opinion on, this as on many other matters.
I have mine, which is that she made no such mistake.

Often I sit alone at night, staring with the eyes of the
mind into the blackness of unborn time, and wondering in
what shape and form the great drama will be finally deve-
loped, and where the scene of its next act wiU be laid. And
when \hdX final development ultimately occurs, as I have no

OVER THE MOVNTAW 317

doubt it must and •will pocuir, in obediemoe to a fate tliat
never swerves and a purpose that cannot be altered, what
will be the part playe4 therein by that beautiful Egyptian
Amenaitas, the Princess of the royal race of the Pharaohs,
for the love of whom the Priest Kallikrates broke his vows
to Isis, and, pursued by the inexorable vengeance of the
outraged Goddess, fled down the coast of Libya to meet
his doom at E6r ?

riNis.

t«IlISTED BT

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THE WIT AND WISDOM OF THE REV.'SYiDNEY SMITR,

THE WIT AND WISDOM OF BENJAMIN DISRAELI, EARL
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London: LONGMANS, GRKElT, <& 00';

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THE EXPERIENCE OF LIFE.

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THE ATELIER DU LYS; or.

An Alt Student in the Seign
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